Kaidan looked up as his mother entered the room and crossed his arms over his chest. "Is she human yet?"
His mother arched and eyebrow at him and gave him a look that had him flushing and muttering something indistinguishable under his breath.
"Fine. So I should go apologize to her now and get it over with?" He demanded with ill grace.
The expression on his mother's face didn't change but she did look over at his father. "What have you been telling him?"
Ken Alenko gave her a beautiful smile. "Just how wise you are, my dear."
A small snorting laugh eased the severity of her look and she turned her attention to Kaidan once more. "What exactly would you be apologizing for?"
"Apparently for thinking that her second trip to Khar'shan is a bad idea." He exploded tossing his hands in the air.
"Hmm." His mother elegantly crossed the room to settle on the wide couch. "I don't even think your Kaet would argue that it's a poor move."
Kaidan gaped at her. "Were you not just there during that conversation?" He asked, the words starting out heated before he reminded himself that this was his mother and he'd better watch it.
A soft smile curved her lips. "That wasn't a conversation, darling, that was two stubborn people trying to outshout each other." He opened his mouth to respond but she wasn't finished. "Don't try to tell me you were in the right and winning, Kaidan. When the name calling starts no one wins."
"She started it." He muttered as anger gave way to exasperation. "Why doesn't she understand I'm just trying to keep her safe? She nearly died! Again!"
Mrs Alenko slipped her shoes off and tucked her feet up under her. "Why don't you understand how scared she is of being out of control and messing this up and that she's doing the only thing she thinks keeps her in control?"
Once again Kaidan simply stared at his mother, confusion rumpling his forehead. "What? Scared? Scared? Commander fucking Shepard has never been scared of a damn thing in her life!"
"Kaidan Kenaan Alenko." His father said in warning.
"Sorry." He mumbled in his mother's general direction.
"I doubt you're completely correct, but I'll let the generalization stand for the moment." Mrs Alenko answered settling comfortably. "I can see how Commander Shepard wouldn't let the fear show, if it existed. She would act and react and defuse the situation with the tactics and skills she has spent a life time of war honing."
"Yes, thank you!" Kaidan jumped on the words. "Exactly what I'm talking about."
"Yes, dear, except we aren't talking about Commander Shepard, we're talking about Kaet."
Kaidan's eyes widened as he slowly blinked at his mother in disbelief. Finally he tossed his hands again with a wordless noise and shoved out of his chair. "I need a drink."
"Oh, good. I'm sure your father wouldn't mind having one as well and since you're up…" Mrs Alenko gave him a beautiful smile.
"I must have been out of my head to think having you here with my wife was a good idea." Kaidan muttered but headed toward the kitchen anyway. "What would you like, Mom?"
"Same as your father, please. And to your other point…you were terrified. And you thought I would side with you and that would make Kaet easier to handle." The smile didn't lose its charm under his glare. "Excellent plan. Poor execution."
Kaidan disappeared into the next room before he said something that really got him into trouble.
He took longer than was needed, filling a platter with fruit and cheese, using the time to consider how Kaet was acting and what his mother was trying to tell him. Finally he returned to the sitting room and set the platter on the coffee table before taking a seat across from his parents and leaning forward.
"Okay. I'm ready to listen." He said in slow, deliberate tones.
Mrs Alenko looked at her husband and sighed softly before returning her attention to her son. "One of your wife's most admirable traits and biggest faults is her lack of ability to compromise. As a soldier, the attitude is responsible for many, if not all of her victories. Failure was a compromise she was unwilling to make so victory became hers and lives…an entire galaxy was saved. As a woman, a wife, it's one of her most frustrating traits and not just for you, Kaidan, but for herself as well. All or nothing. Everything in or go home. No half measures."
Kaidan frowned. "She's always been that way, Mom. Nothing's changed. I don't understand."
"What kind of mother do you think she will be, Kaidan?" Mrs Alenko asked softly.
For a moment he paused as a slow smile curved his lips. "A wonderful one. Most people don't get to see her…the softer her. She holds nothing back when she allows herself to love. She found out the baby is a biotic and her first instinct was to protect and care for her. She's already threatened to shoot people who treat the baby badly." His shoulders lifted and fell in a helpless, loving shrug. "You should hear her trying to modify her language because she's worried the baby will learn to swear in utero."
"A very valid concern." Mrs Alenko said with a deadpan humor while Ken hid a laugh behind a fake clearing of his throat.
"Don't start on her, Mom." Kaidan said with weary tones. "She's trying."
"Yes, she is." Mrs Alenko agreed, her brown eyes gazing at him. "She's been researching how to be a mother. Diapers, feeding and other things as well I'm sure, since I can't imagine her doing anything half way."
A faint frown touched Kaidan's mouth. "She didn't say anything, but I'm not surprised. Knowledge is the ultimate power in Kaet's world."
"Because if she knows it, understands it, she can control it." Ken offered wrapping an arm about his wife, a shrewd smile on his lips.
"She's never been a mother before." Mrs Alenko prodded gently, her gaze never leaving the thoughtful expression on her son's face. "What she knows best is…"
"The Great Commander Shepard." Kaidan finished the hanging sentence before scrubbing his hands over his face. "Does she think this is any easier for me? I've never been a father before…and quite frankly right now the thought of a biotic daughter that is a stubborn as her mother is terrifying. I don't know if I have the strength to handle both of them."
"You'll find the strength." Ken entered the conversation again, a smile so much like his son's lifting a corner of his mouth. "You won't know where it's coming from or how much there is, but you'll find it. The alternative will be unacceptable to you."
Kaidan was quiet a long moment, considering the advice. "How do I convince her not to go to Khar'shan again?"
His mother shook her head slightly. "You can't. She's convinced this is her last hurrah before her lack of ability to compromise puts the Great Commander Shepard away forever in favor of Mommy Shepard."
Kaidan sunk his face into his hands.
"You can go with her." Ken pointed out. "I doubt she'd object to that."
"Right now she and I can't even be in the same room without fighting, Dad." Kaidan's frustration and unhappiness was clear in the troubled look on his face.
"There's always sex." Mrs Alenko pointed out.
Kaidan closed his eyes. "Oh, this is a conversation I never wanted to have with my mother." He mumbled to himself.
"Don't knock it, son." Ken laughed. "You think you're the only who's ever butted heads with a stubborn woman?" The expression his wife favored him with wasn't quite a warning, just a mere caution.
"You love each other. You both are unhappy with the anger between you and neither of you knows how to fix it without bending your pride." Mrs Alenko continued the thought. "If you can't speak without arguing then remind yourselves of that love by touching."
"That doesn't solve anything." He objected shaking his head.
"No, but there is a promise involved in touching…the right sort of touching." Ken surprised him by continuing. "The promise to try. To try to work it out. To try and see the other's point of view. The vow to not give up or give in but to keep trying because what you are together is worth it."
Kaidan studied his father for a long moment, considering the words before his gaze moved to his mother and back again. Ken nodded.
"Loving a stubborn, strong woman can be the most wonderful thing in the world." His father said with a laugh as he wrapped an arm about his wife. "It can also be the most frustrating, infuriating, drive you to drink experience you will ever have. You just remind yourself that it's worth it. You remind yourself of who you are when they two of you are together and how strong you are."
"And how alone you are when you forget to be a team and instead try to fix everything on your own." His mother agreed leaning closer to Ken.
"When Kaet gets scared she retreats. She hides behind her walls and tries to force or manipulate everything to be the way she wants it to be." Kaidan murmured more to himself than his parents. "She tries to fix everything the way she wants it fixed because that's the only way she knows how not to be scared again."
"Being Commander Shepard is safe and comfortable for her. She knows who she is when she is the Great Commander Shepard. She knows how she's supposed to act and react and what to do." Mrs Alenko prodded him a bit further with the idea. "Being a mother is a new and scary change for her…and she does not react well to change of this sort."
"No, she freaks out and stops talking." Kaidan gave a soft laugh as he ran a hand through his hair. "If our wedding day didn't teach me that, nothing will."
"Well, think of how she was then and then toss in a bunch of hormones, mix well, and you'll have your wife's present state." Mrs Alenko watched her son. "You need to know something else as well, Kaidan. Part of why she's picking a fight with you."
"Guilt." Kaidan said the word quietly and almost smiled at the surprised look on his mother's face. "It's been years since she lost members of her squad to enemy action. She's forgotten how she dealt with it. How the war forced her to deal quickly with the pain of knowing she wasn't good enough to bring everyone home. There wasn't time to properly grieve and when the war was over there was too much to celebrate and rebuild. So she picks a fight with me because if she's mad she doesn't have to be sad over the soldiers she lost."
"There's more, as well." Mrs Alenko continued after his words had trailed off into a thoughtful peace. "In the past she's survived because of skill and dumb luck and she has always completed the mission assigned. There was none of that this time. She survived because 17 men and women laid down their lives to make certain she survived. They died for her, Kaidan, and she knows it."
His gaze snapped toward his mother, narrowing in swift comprehension. "For her. Not the mission." The idea gained solid belief as he spoke the words aloud.
"It's why she has to finish this, Kaidan. Not just to accomplish the mission…but to make the lives lost worth the cost."
Kaidan nodded his head, his attention more on the floor as he sorted out the thoughts. Finally he rose to his feet and crossed over to his mother, pressing a kiss to her forehead and hugging his father. "It's a good thing I have such smart parents."
Ken laughed. "Don't worry, son. Someday you'll be in our place while your children fight it out with their significant others."
A beautiful smile creased Kaidan's lips. "Someday Kaet's going to have a daughter or son-in-law that is exactly as stubborn and willful as she is."
A more feminine version of that same expression curved Mrs Alenko's lips. "I so look forward to that day." She said with a heartfelt sigh that could almost have been called glee.