1.16 - A Second Chance

Isabel's excited to show her work to her Dad. The next day, he comes outside to look at her amazing dinosaur reconstruction. He's really impressed, and asks Isabel if she wants to start doing some work at his lab with him.

You can imagine how happy that makes Isabel!

A future budding Paleontologist?

Appaloosa Plains once housed a large number of scientists for the dig site of ancient fossilized remains.
But now most of the remains had been removed to museums. Isabel had managed to revive a little of that excitement. Her impressive talent earned her a place among the prestigious geek ranks at Dad's Lab.

"Your daughter has a very rare talent and we'd love to offer her a full scholarship when she graduates."
 (That's Simon's boss Kenji)

Isabel loved going to work with Dad. Her teachers even let her out early every day so she could spend part of her day studying at the science center. Her grades and performance were perfect and she had been on the honor roll three straight semesters running.

It was here, spending hours digging through the old science archives, that Isabel began to formulate her future.

"William Bedlington, first Archaeology Specialist for Morcucorp Acquisitions Dept."

And when her Dad began to spend a LOT of time talking to that woman and visiting her, Isabel used the lab computers to learn some other tricks too. Isabel overheard Simon inviting Sarah over to spend an evening at the lab with them.

"Of course you can come hang out with us here, we'd love your company, darling!"

Isabel has other ideas.

<insert evil laughter here>

She dabbles a bit with the chemistry table.

This is probably something Simon should be giving somewhat more supervision on, but he's typically lax as ever with Isabel, and busy messing with fish in the aquarium.

"Despite their name, not all catfish have prominent barbels ... OWW! Ok, this one does!"

And the perfect potion has been mixed ...

"Liquid Horror"

<insert more evil laughter here>

Isabel's not really evil, she's just too damn smart for her own good. She figures she can scare Dad's girlfriend away one way or another.

But the unintended victim of her computer prank ended up being Dad when he tried to check his bank balance.

"Aaaaagh! ... Isabel!!!"

And lamo-girlfriend never even showed up, complaining of a "headache" ... so Isabel decided to save the potion for later use.

But try as she might, nothing she did could convince Dad away from his new girlfriend. In fact, just when Simon was about to reassure Isabel that he was only dating Sarah casually, things took a turn for the worse in Isabel's opinion.

Simon yelling: "Sarah, lets go, we're going to be late for our dinner reservation!"

Yeah, things were about to get complicated.

"Simon, I know this is crazy, but ... I'm pregnant."

Simon was just getting used to the idea of being in love again after such a terrible heartbreak with his ex-wife. He considered himself years away from re-marriage, let alone having another child.

A rather awkward moment.

But to his credit, Simon has learned a tough lesson from his failed first marriage. He's not going to let this woman down, and he's going to do the right thing. He just needs some time to think and figure this out.

Like his daughter, Simon thinks best when surrounded by his work down in the underground lab.

He faces his fears.

"Simon you old fool, you're about to hit your middle years. Time to get your life in order."

And he realizes he's ready to stop being so paranoid about money all the time. His position was moving towards senior scientist and he had a good retirement fund.

"I'm not going to worry about the simoleons anymore!"

He was ready to embrace the hand he was being dealt and be a family man. He had fallen in love with Sarah, of this he was sure. And more importantly, she needed him. She was carrying his child and as much as he loved Isabel, he knew he would love another little one too.

And so it was easy the next day to head out to the Equestrian Center where Sarah worked as a stable hand to let her know his decision.

Being a dignified professional horsewoman is impossible when you waddle.

Sarah was frightened when Simon showed up. She thought she would end up dumped and a single Mom like her sister Stacy had just went through - a complete embarrassment to her prestigious family.

"Sarah, don't turn away. I'm not going to hurt you like your family has done ..."

Simon lets Sarah know he very much wants to have a child with her.

"Another little Twist Genius in the making!"

And right there on the spot he proposes to Sarah. They'd only been together a short time, and Sarah can't believe it, but she's so relieved and so happy!

"Oh Simon! Thank you for making me the happiest woman on the Sim Planet!"

Other parties, however, are not quite as thrilled with the news.

"Getting married... having a BABY?! Dad are you trying to ruin my entire life!?"

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Read HERE  for Ch. 1.17 - "Growing Pains"