I'm not used to writing shipper fanfics. I might have a ship in the middle of a story, but it's never been the focus of the story. I enjoy reading Shenko, so I decided to try my hand at writing one. To you fanfiction writers out there that write shipper fics on a regular basis, I tip my hat to you and give you a round of applause. Shipper fics are more difficult than I thought.
I took some liberties with some of the technical stuff. The armor, the mako, etc...some of this stuff may not be described exactly how it works in game but I took those liberties to make the story work...to get the characters in the situations where I needed them to be...how I needed them to be.
There are a few cuss words...and some sexual suggestions and innuendo if you read between the lines, but I don't think I went overboard with it nevertheless I'm rating the story M just in case. According to spoilers you can continue your romance with the character you romanced in ME in ME2 or you can pick a new romance partner. My question was if you turned down a potential romantic partner in ME would you have the opportunity to reopen a possible romance with that same character in ME2. That's where this fanfic comes in. A failed romance and relationship between Kaidan and Shepard has repercussions long after Saran and Sovereign are defeated.
The story turned out rather long so I decided to break it up into chapters for ease of reading.
Disclaimer: Mass Effect and Characters belong to Bioware.
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"And you call me paranoid". Joker snorted.
"I'm not paranoid. I just don't think she likes me," Kaidan explained.
"Okay I'll bite. What makes you think that she doesn't like you?" Joker asked, rolling his eyes back in his head.
"She never talks to me like she does the rest of the crew. Occasionally, she asks my opinion on the last mission but nothing more than that. And you have to admit she rarely if ever picked me for squad. I really didn't even get to help take down Saren." Kaidan explained.
Joker chuckled, " First off she doesn't dish about her personal life to anyone that I know."
I...I didn't mean her personal life." Kaidan interrupted, stammering as he did, " I just meant anything not related to our job."
Kaidan lowered his head.
"Yeah, right...sure, she may discuss non-related mission stuff to a few people, but not everyone." Joker responded, a little sensed that he was interrupted. " Second as far as Saren is concerned, you went on the mission to Virmire.
A pained look flashed across Kaidan's eyes as Virmire was mentioned. Even though the entire crew had attended Ash's memorial service as a way to put her death behind them, the thought of her death still carried a sting.
He knew soldiers died. He knew it was a part of the job. But Ash had been a friend, one of the few on the Normandy that understood his confusion over Commander Shepard, and the only one he had really been able to talk to about it. When Ash died he had felt alone and lost.
"We all went on the mission to Virmire if you'll recall. The Normandy landed there." Kaidan responded, sounding rather annoyed.
"Yeah...whatever...you were at least an active part of the ground team" Joker dryly offered in response.
"I only armed the bomb, Joker." Kaidan retorted.
" Hey someone had to do it." Joker spat back , "...just glad it wasn't me, besides she asked you to go on this mission didn't she?"
" Yeah, but only because Tali went back to the flotilla and she needed a tech." Kaidan answered.
"I think you've got it all wrong Alenko. She chose you didn't she...I mean on Virmire." Joker stated flatly. It was the first time his voice really softened.
Kaidan massaged his left temple. He had felt the migraine begin when the conversation had turned towards Virmire. Now his head had begun to throb.
"She didn't choose me...she chose the mission. If Saren had been able to disarm that bomb we'd be fighting a damn near unstoppable army of Krogans on top of the Geth and the Reapers." Kaidan explained.
It was the one explanation that Shepard had given Kaidan that had succeeded in alleviating his guilt about Ashley's death. Shepard had went out of her way to convince him that the mission had come first and he had simply lucked out by being at the bomb sight rather than the AA Tower.
This time it was Joker that lowered his head.
"Yeah, Sure...whatever." Joker mumbled. " I know your right. There was no way anyone could have seen what was coming."
Joker had crushed on Ashley from the first day she had joined the crew and although Ashley was aware of the fact, she had never acted on it. Nevertheless she had gone out of her way to be nice to Joker, even occasionally teasing with him. A part of Kaidan thought that Ashley might have really liked Joker but didn't know how to proceed because of his illness. Since she never talked about it, Kaidan never asked.
"Perhaps with the way things turned out, it's a good thing they never hooked up." thought Kaidan.
"Things don't always go the way we would like them too." Kaidan said out loud.
"Are we back to you and the Commander again?" spat Joker, his somber mood forgotten.
"It was the topic of conversation." said Kaidan, glad to move away from the subject of Ashley, if nothing more than for changing Joker's mood.
"Geez, Alenko as much as you mull over the Commander with does she like me or does she like me not, one might begin to think that you're her personal stalker." Joker mused.
"Joker." said Kaidan. "I'm not that bad."
This time Kaidan was the one who rolled his eyes.
"You should see yourself from where I'm sitting." Joker jabbed back.
" Lieutenant ?" the voice interrupted. A wiry young man had swaggered up to the bridge unnoticed by either Joker or Kaidan.
Ash's replacement wasn't even half the soldier she had been. He was straight out of the academy and green as a gourd. Nevertheless Kaidan thought he seemed likable enough.
" Yes, Private Wright?" Kaidan answered.
" The Commander is already at the Mako sir. She said to suit up and get down there as soon as possible." the young private relayed.
"Already?" Kaidan responded. Even though he had not meant to say it out loud, Private Wright took it as a question directed at him.
"Yes, sir. And if you don't mind me saying sir, she seemed a little angry that you weren't ready" the private offered.
Kaidan looked back at Joker.
"Don't look at me...not my problem." Joker said.
Kaidan shook his head and sighed. He rubbed his temples as his migraine had become full blown.
" See ya later, Joker" he managed.
"Yeah, whatever." Joker said. "Don't forget your personal stalker kit."
"I'll just borrow yours." Kaidan bit back sarcastically.
Failing to get the joke, Private Wright looked dumbfounded as the lieutenant followed him off the bridge.
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That had been several hours ago. Kaidan looked down at the figure he held in his arms.
"She looks so fragile...so innocent." he thought.
Her long dark hair had come undone and fell loosely around her shoulders. Despite the fresh cut on her forehead, Kaidan noticed how young she looked without her trademark up-do hairstyle.
"She must wear it up like that to make herself look older...to look more authoritative." he mused.
He reached out and ran a finger down one of the strands. It was something he never would have done if she were conscious...something he would have hesitated doing even with her unconscious but it was something that Kaidan could easily do when he had a headache of this magnitude. At times the pain came on so strong he felt drunk and unaware of where he was. For the moment, it took him out of himself just long enough to touch the flowing locks of the woman he had come to admire so much.
Where is the woman who practically single handily took down the rogue Spectre Saren and the reaper Sovereign? Where is the woman who was the hero of Elysium? Where is the woman who served the alliance and the galaxy numerous times saving many lives in the process? Surely this can't be her?
"Ahhhh But it is." thought Kaidan as his thoughts began to ramble. His migraine had reached major status and he found it increasingly hard to concentrate.
"You don't look like a Spectre. You look like someones lover." Kaidan whispered out loud.
Had he actually said that? He had meant to say daughter.
Panic set in as he felt his heart began to beat wildly.
"She didn't hear me did she?" he thought.
Looking intently at her face convinced him she was still out.
"She didn't hear." He whispered, relieved.
"Oh God, Joker's right...I am a stalker." thought Kaidan.
He had dismissed the joke earlier but with his headache raging and his thoughts becoming increasingly incoherent it began to nag at him. At times like these he could become irrational. Things that didn't bother him before suddenly would. Biotic geneticists classified it in layman's terms as being on the edge. Those who went over were said to have been made insane by the L2 implants. Those that didn't were said to be lucky. Kaidan was lucky. He had never gone over, but he had teetered on the edge many times.
One of those geneticists had told Kaidan that luck had nothing to do with it at all. It was his self control. Kaidan subconsciously refused to let go of anything in his life including his mind. When pressed he would force himself to focus so as not to trip over the edge no matter how intense the pain became.
However after Eden Prime he had worried. He had made a conscious decision not to hold back anymore when it came to his biotic abilities. His concern was that letting go in one area might affect other areas in his life including his mind. With time it became apparent that such was not the case and his fears began to dissipate.
That decision had also revealed just how much Kaidan had held back with his biotics. Something that was not lost on Wrex and the other members of the crew. It was one of the reasons he couldn't understand why the Commander had kept him back from so many missions in taking down Saren. He had proven that he was as capable as anyone else in the crew if not more so, yet she continued to exclude him as much as possible.
"Why not me?" he whispered into Shepard's still unconscious face.
He wasn't so sure he was talking about missions at this point. The nagging question about being a stalker was still floating around in the back of his mind.
" I meant daughter...not lover!" Kaidan said decisively, addressing his previous comment.
Shepard didn't stir.
He realized that he was dangling off the edge and mentally began to take a step back. The renewed concentration caused a stab of pain to dance across his forehead and pierce through his already throbbing brain into the base of his neck where his implant rested. The mental explosion almost crippled him as he doubled over in pain.
"Damn!" he swore.
It was bad. Kaidan couldn't remember having a headache this bad in years. It felt like someone had rammed a hot poker through his skull.
A loud thump banged from outside the mako. He jerked his head up, causing the intensifying pain to explode afresh. This time tears came to his eyes as he was nearly blinded from the affliction. He wanted to scream. Stubbornly he refused to give in.
Gritting his teeth he whispered, "It's just debris from the storm."
His determination paid off. Despite the fact that the pain permeated every crevice of his overloaded brain, his thought patterns began to clear.
He looked back down at Shepard's unconscious body.
Even wrapped snugly beneath the medi-blankets Kaidan could still feel her shivering. Consistently he began to rub his hands back and forth over her covered arms in an attempt to speed her warming.
Now more alert, he became aware of the dropping temperature.
He had fared better than the Commander in the blast and suffered no physical injuries but not even his armor was suited for enduring the cold of a hazard level 2 planet for an extended period of time.
"I'm going to have to ditch this soon." he thought.
The lab created fibers of his armor had a natural cooling affect to them. In cold environments a heating mechanism much like the one used in the mako, though on a smaller scale, was used to keep it's wearer warm. But like anything mechanical it had to be fueled. The omni-gel in Kaidan's armor had ran out only minutes after the blast that had knocked Shepard out cold. The warmth his suit had provided was fading.
Kaidan shivered as the wind howled against the mako's outer shell. If he had more omni-gel he could have repaired the damaged rover but he had fell short. The best she could offer in her damaged state was life support and a few dim emergency lights. The atmospheric control that would have provided them with the warmth they so badly needed was completely inoperable.