Chapter 498: Hey! Look! It’s A Girl

I’m still banned from Pat’s room. I wonder what is going on in court today.

“David,” a familiar voice said when I answered my phone. “We sent her to get an MRI and a CT scan. It showed a likely reason she kept tripping over her own feet. At some point, the patient broke her left foot. It isn’t in any medical records, and she doesn’t remember doing it. On an X-Ray, it looks normal, but the scans indicated that it has never fully healed. We had her walking in the exoskeleton, and even without touching the ground, she favors that foot. She is in the robotic surgical suite right now. Whoever is doing the remote surgery said they need to clean up a lot of scar tissue. They explained that they would need to remove three bones and replace them with artificial bone scaffolding. We needed to redo the cast on her leg anyway.”

My implant pinged me, and I got a message from the man-in-the-machine telling me he wasn’t involved in that surgery. It was a well-renowned pediatric orthopedic surgeon who specialized in foot reconstruction. The surgeon was doing it at no cost under an NDA because he would be one of a few dozen to get exclusive access to one of the earlier versions of the bone goo currently undergoing FDA trials. Our hospital had the latest formulation, but the surgeon didn’t know. It could take up to six hours, but Pat would be back in her room and awake before her former foster family arrived.

I didn’t have anything else to do right now, so I went around the complex checking on things. I popped into one of the suites in some buildings to talk with the chaperone or kids. I got a list of complaints, suggestions, and general things the kids liked. I used my implant to keep track of them. Only a few were “on hold” for more in-depth review and discussion. The staff was working on the others.

I looked at the general maintenance of suites and common areas in other buildings. I noted some that needed instructions on keeping their bedrooms, kid’s den area, and shared common areas clean. Using underwear as a rag to clean the floor wasn’t going to fly.

If we didn’t have cable to all the TVs, I could see some justification for using an underwire bra as a stand-in for rabbit ears.

An office runner came to get me where I was having a late-night snack in a cafeteria. Pat’s previous foster family went through each interview level to enter the facility. It hadn’t taken all that long, and they finished before I got to the front office.

I picked up their bags and said, “Let me show you where you are staying tonight so you can take a wash up, change clothes, and take care of any other business you need before we go see Pat.”

When I got to the part of the facility where guests and families stayed, I saw that they matched the ones in the kid dorms. The parents had the chaperone’s room while the boys got one of the six individual bedroom and bathroom combos. I went to wait outside for them, but the mom insisted she didn’t want to look for me when they were ready to see Pat.

I grabbed a soda from the fridge and a candy bar from the cabinet.

“How much do the soda and candy cost?” one of the boys asked.

I shrugged and said, “No clue. I’ve never asked. I’m sure we buy everything in truckloads, so it is probably a pretty good price. Help yourself. All the stuff in the fridge and cabinets is for whoever stays in this suite. Staff will come to restock it at some point. If you don’t see something you want, pick up the phone and dial zero. For your safety, you can’t go wandering the grounds. That tablet on the counter has a menu of whatever the open cafeteria is serving right now. Order what you want, but don’t ask for more than you are sure you can eat.”

The other boy came out, and both decided they would eat like their bottomless pits. One was working his way through a bag of chips, and the other an apple when their food arrived.

Evil, but it proves why staying here is for their safety.

Four girls, between fourteen and sixteen, brought in the food. The boys didn’t need to see the girls naked to know what they would see if the girls decided to strip. I could see it affected both boys and the girls noticed. I let the girl take the boys back to the kid’s den area for long enough that the girls would have milked a load out of each boy.

“Girls! Out! I’m not letting their food get cold, and you have hundreds of boys your age here to molest. Leave the guests alone,” I yelled into the kid’s den area.

All four girls hurried out to hug me and kiss me on the cheek before leaving.

“Oh, they are cuter than what Pat described. Can I please have five minutes with each of them? I want to let them do to me what they would never do with Pat,” a girl asked.

“Out!” I told her and swatted her butt through her skin-tight shorts. She wasn’t wearing any panties.

The boy’s parents had come out when I yelled for the girls to leave.

“Sorry about that. I think the boys got set up. Those were some of Pat’s friends. I’m pretty sure that hugs and kissing aren’t what they had in mind,” I told the adults.

The boys weren’t listening because they were doing their best to eat all the food to order more.

I told the boys, “I wouldn’t risk it. The cafeteria must be busy tonight because the staff should bring food to this building, not the kids here.”

“How much have these two garbage disposals cost me so far? Is that steak?” the mom asked.

I shrugged and said, “The only people paying for food here are the accounting office. What you find in the fridge and cabinets is what is in all the kid’s suites. Everyone has a private apartment in the adult building, so they have to stock it themselves. They aren’t paying for it but have to get it from wherever they have it stored here.”

“This looks like the pictures Pat sent us when she got here,” the dad remarked.

“Makes sense. This is how we have the dorms set up. You are in the room where the adult chaperone for the suite lives. Kids have a private den and individual bedrooms. Not my design, but it works amazingly well. Other than needing to move kids around to different suites when they can’t get along with someone in theirs, we don’t see many problems,” I explained. “I think there is a coffee machine in your room. I heard some kids ask us to put them in the suites but were told no. If they want coffee, they can go to one of the cafeterias. They will drink it nonstop if it is in the suites.”

“I bet that went over like a sack of bricks,” the mom commented.

“From how I heard it,” I started saying. “The kids got told if they had a coffeemaker in the suite, then they had to agree to clean up all the coffee stains. I don’t think that was as big of a roadblock as being told they had to go to the dentist to have their teeth cleaned monthly to remove the coffee stains for their machine.”

That made them all laugh.

I sent a message to the staff to ask if Pat was awake yet. They said she was getting helped into the exoskeleton to use the bathroom. She took off her gown because it kept getting in the way when she used the bathroom. She still had to wear a diaper for a few more days as a precaution, but so far, tonight had been able to do her thing all on her own.

“Pat is up and around, so we can go up to see her now,” I told them.

She was washing her hands in the bathroom when I knocked on the door and told her, “Pat, you have some guests that came to see you now that you are awake.”

She asked, “Can you pick up the towel so I can dry my hands? I keep dropping it.”

One of the boys passed me like a shot to pick it up off the floor to give her.

“Thanks, Jase,” Pat said without even realizing who was in the bathroom with her. “Can you help me get back into bed? I’m still not that good at getting in and out of it yet.”

Jase helped her exoskeleton before getting her into a gown and diaper. He tucked her in before sitting on the bed with her.

“Had to outdo yourself, didn’t you, Pat,” Jase told her.

The two bantered away for a few minutes before her foster mother hugged Pat.

Pat’s pain meds took nearly twenty minutes before it finally got into her head that she was in the foster care complex’s hospital.

“What are you doing here?” she said, trying to see if she was just dreaming. “How are you here?”

“I called them and asked them if they could come,” I told Pat.

I let them visit while I put some more of my plan into motion.

I found the pediatrician on duty and asked, “Long story short. Pat’s a clutz, and her state got tired of paying her medical bill, so they pulled her away from the foster family that loved her and wanted to adopt her. Their sons took care of her when she broke her right leg, so no issues there. One of the boys got past me to pick up the towel Pat dropped, got her out of the exoskeleton, into a diaper and gown, and then helped her in bed. They were bantering away when it finally hit her that this was a foster care hospital. The family lives two states away.”

“Great history, David. What do you want? I’ve got patients to go torment,” he joked.

“Pat seems to have mostly gotten the hang of the exoskeleton. The IV and monitor connect to the exoskeleton, and I know they designed this model to allow the user to wear it most of the time, except when charging or bathing. Seeing how the boy put the IV back on the pole by her bed and put the monitor back in the base, it isn’t the first time he had to do that for her. Do you think I can spring her out of here and let her stay in the guest suite with them? All five of them have to go through the gauntlet in the morning before I can dump another kid on some family and get them out of here,” I told him.

He went to the computer, looked over her charts, and said, “If you hadn’t gotten us that magic bone substrate, Pat would be here for a few more days. As long as she stays put and doesn’t try to break something else, she can go there. I will have a nurse scheduled to check on her IV and pain management every two hours. She is a tough kid for being so clumsy. When she was in pain, Pat asked for over-the-counter meds instead of narcotics. It didn’t take the edge off, but she held out for an hour before apologizing for needing something with a bit more kick. You must get her down there and show them how to charge her super suit.”

“Oh no, you don’t get to go back to sleep, Pat. I got you an upgraded room, but you must walk there yourself. Let me show everyone how to help you get hooked into your exoskeleton. You can wear it most of the time but have to take it off to charge for safety reasons,” I told her. “That is unless you don’t want to go down the suite to let them help you when you need it.”

Pat almost hurt herself, getting back out of bed. We have her IV and the monitor placed in their spots. I had to show all four of her foster family the three contacts connected to her nerves. She was still getting used to how the suit moved. She didn’t know that it was still limited to a slow walk.

A nurse followed us down with a cart. It had IV bags, diapers, wipes, gowns, and other things Pat may need. Once she verified that the monitor was connected to the hospital system correctly, the nurse left.

The boys didn’t need any instructions on how to care for Pat. Jase changed the IV bag to a full one before helping Pat to one of the rooms and getting her in bed. All these rooms had queen-sized beds. The two boys flipped for it. Jase lost, so the other boy got to stay in the room with Pat for the night.

It doesn’t matter anyway, boys. You are both barely awake as it is.

I sat down with Pat’s previous foster parents for a chat.

“I hope you will forgive me for not introducing myself. I’m David. This place is one of the four foster care mega complexes I run in the U.S. I foot the entire cost out of my pocket. Any money the government wants to pay for a kid’s care goes into an interest-bearing account in that child’s name. They don’t have to leave here when they turn eighteen, only move into the adult apartment building. We have classes from most of the largest colleges that they can attend remotely. If they decide to leave, they take everything in their bank account with them. There is a cap on how much they can take out every two weeks until they are twenty-five. We are protecting them from themselves. I know they don’t pay foster families all that much to cover costs, but the various government agents have insisted that they pay us a minimum of two thousand a month for each child, and in most cases, it is more. They feel they are getting off cheap from the few bean counters I talked to about things. There is no cost to any children or people working here for anything. We cover all dental, medical, mental health, job training, sports, computers, clothing, food, and anything else they might need. That doesn’t mean they get everything they want, but we do ensure everyone has what they need,” I explained.

Before they could ask, “No, I don’t know how much it cost to fix up Pat after this latest accident, and it doesn’t matter. I pay the doctors exceptionally well because they are among the best in the world. You would be amazed at how inexpensive a hospital stay is when you own the hospital, and no insurance companies are involved.”

“I’m glad you called. The boys miss Pat. When their sister died, it took a toll on all of us. It will be hard on them when we have to leave,” Pat’s previous foster dad said.

I laughed and got dirty looks from them.

Finally, I said, “Yeah. I can see that since only one can sit beside Pat in the van. The other has to ride in the back seat. That is unless you trust your oldest to drive your car home. The night owls are working it over right now. It takes a lot of love, but it should be ready to go before you finish with the shrinks and administrators. It is mostly a formality for the bureaucrats. If you had any dark secrets, the people who talked to you before you could get to my office would have found them out.”

“Why would we take Pat home with us? The foster care system in our state dumped her here,” the mom asked.

“That is precisely why you are going to take her home. They moved her here. Let me make it simple. Whoever worked on this crazy idea of the foster complex did it so that all these children are technically my foster children. Some are orphans, like Pat, and kids taken from their homes for their safety, sometimes permanently,” I explained. “To make things less stressful for the kids, each complex has a family court, just like the state-run system. It gives me a list of judges approved to be over each family court, but I pay the judge’s salary, housing and cover all their benefits. What gets me is an expedited way to get rid of kids like Pat.”

“Why would you want to get rid of her? She loves it here,” the mom interrupted.

I looked her in the eyes and said, “Because you want her as your daughter, and she wants to be your daughter. I watched how not one of you thought anything of your boys seeing her naked or Jase caring for her like a sister. I’m sorry you lost your daughter. I can’t fix that. As long as you are sure you want to adopt her, I will get that done tomorrow afternoon. There are no costs, lawyers, waiting periods, or any other shit. I’m even giving you a new minivan because there is no way she can get into your car with the cast, much less the exoskeleton. More surprises will come, but you probably want to get some sleep. It will be a busy day tomorrow.”

I quickly went in to check on Pat. She was sleeping soundly, her IV bag was still full, and she didn’t appear to be in pain. The nurse came in as I was leaving the suite.

Even as late as it was, someone directed me to my office.

“I need you to sign a ton of paperwork to ensure that you remain Pat’s legal guardian. It also stipulates that her family gives you guardianship of the two boys until they are eighteen, should something happen to the parents. These are to ensure that their state doesn’t take custody of them in that case. We have begun doing something to ensure that any adopted children and those in their new families are kept together and brought here as a group if they end up in the foster care system. As an aside, it allows us to transport the children to our nearest complex, or medical facility, to give them urgent medical care,” a woman in my office told me. “The other paperwork is to authorize providing medical insurance for all three children with no deductibles. You recently acquired an insurance company to provide medical insurance for any of those you take into your care when they are away from the complex and can’t be transported here for urgent care. We have established a network of preferred facilities and doctors across the country. I expected a more difficult time with the negotiations, but it was simple.”

As I read, she explained how doctors and medical facilities didn’t mind us paying based on the bean counters’ estimations of what it cost to care for that same condition at our complex. We have equipment generations ahead of the best they can buy right now.

“Once details of our repayment rates were made available, we had doctors and hospitals contacting your insurance company to beg us to sign contracts with us. I can promise you they won’t try to charge us ten grand for a box of tissues like my mother did when she asked for a tissue. There were only ten in the pack, and they weren’t even good ones,” she said.

A man who was clearly a bean counter came in and said, “It is a sweet deal for them, David. Because these are foster children, we could have forced them to take whatever the rates paid by the state-funded healthcare they have when in the foster care system. I worked as a controller for hospitals and physicians’ practices, so I know that what those programs pay is often less than the costs of services. Frequently the amount paid for vaccinations was half the cost of a vial of that vaccine. At one practice, we were lucky enough to recoup enough from the office visit charges to pay for the syringe, needle, gloves, and bandage.”

“We had many who argued that once a child left our care, it was no longer our problem. We shouldn’t continue providing dental, medical, and mental health services to these children as if they were still our wards,” the woman said.

I smiled and told them, “I wasn’t involved with any of this, but I like the idea of covering their medical costs and those of any other children in that household.”

“Why, if I may ask,” the woman wanted to know.

“Because,” I explained. “When a kid leaves here, it is because they left voluntarily, got adopted, or were allowed to return to their family. If it costs nothing for their kids to go to the doctor, dentist, or shrink, they are more likely to take the kid for even little things like a stuffy nose. That will get us more facetime with the child and thus more opportunity to look for any signs of abuse. After living here, we can only hope that any child getting abused would tell someone so we can bring them back here to protect them while we investigate.”

She looked at me before asking if I was sure I was only eighteen.

“Hey. My doctor always at least pulled up the back of my shirt to listen to my heart. The pediatricians at the house do the same thing, so it can’t be something new,” I told them. “Since it won’t cost the family anything, would it make sense to add something to the contract that says if the kid hasn’t been to the doctor in three months that the child gets a full checkup, including some form of a genital exam if appropriate? I don’t know what part of a girl’s regular checkup is.”

The woman said that it depends on the doctor. For her daughter, the girl stripped to her panties and put on a gown. The doctor would lift her panties to take a quick peek, but that was it. Her granddaughter’s pediatrician never had the child undress or raise the girl’s shirt. It was all done over clothes, even those parts where they used their hands to check the abdomen.

“That isn’t going to be an issue, David. Due to the child development research data we collect on all of our wards. They must provide a written report when seeing a child, and digital images of the unclothed child from the front and side are also required. This process is explained to each child when they go through medical on arrival and during their checkups. Physically and sexually abused children see the doctor multiple times a week until their injuries heal. We photographically document them on each visit,” a different man said.