"School exams are a pain!" Deca said stretching out on the couch.

"Yeah but holidays are after, where are you spending yours?" Shepard said playing with her hair as her head lay on his lap. She leaned back her head so she could see his eyes.

"With one of the other Spartans or with Mum, Dad not so much. He's too busy and I'd be alone which is usual" Deca said shrugging.

"Well," he started.

"Well what?" Deca asked. He shook his head to say no. "Thom you can tell me now what?" She asked.

"What if I asked you to come with me to my home and then I go to yours so we split the holidays with both our families?" he suggested.

Deca sat up raising an eyebrow. "You do know who my father is right? And if he met you...well you wouldn't exactly come off second best or even at best" She called on the face who her father was.

"Deca, I'm dating you, I love you and I am going to tell your father that nothing is going to stop that even if he sets the whole UNSC army after me" Shepard said.

She laughed half giggling. "If he did, I don't think there would be much time for running, and since you admitted it first I love you too" Deca agreed.

"Well in that case" he bent down kissing her nose and forehead making her giggle a little too much.

"Cue romantic music get some candles...oh that too" She said as he moved down to her lips. "

So you agree?" Shepard questioned her. "Because if you refuse I can easily get you to bend into my will"

"Do I have much choice?" She questioned her.

"No" Shepard bluntly put.

"Well I always wanted to see a normal family," Deca pulled him down to kiss more.


Deca packed her small duffle bag and took down some pictures she wanted to show some things to her many aunts and uncle's when she reached her base. There was a knock at the door as Beta entered.

"Hey sis," He said.

"Hey Sam, how are you finding the Academy?" Deca asked.

"It's amazing! No wonder you wanted to leave home early" Beta exclaimed.

"Yeah, so you heading home?" Deca asked.

"No"

"No?" Deca raised a brow.

"I'm going to stay with Andromeda, the twins and Cameo at a lake house. We knew Shepard asked you to stay with him so we didn't bother asking you, but the invitation is stil open" Beta sat down on the bed in her room. "Dad and I...he just doesn't want me to be here because he thinks I'm going to be become a machine Cortana! I just...he doesn't get the fact that I want to do this to help people!" Beta cried.

Deca sat down next to him. "That's the first time you have called me Cortana since we first got here. Look Sam, Dad is trying his hardest with us. It's not exactly like they taught him and our many aunts and uncles to be kind and gentle or even have kids! Just...give him a break!" Deca hugged her little brother.

"Dad doesn't...he is just...okay, remember when I was ten and your were seven, it was Halloween and I dressed up as a witch, you dressed up as a brute from the covenant. Dad freaked because he saw your costume and I had to change you into a caveman. It's his memories not you that he thinks are the problem, and we are growing up so it's harder for him to learn he can't protect us forever. Just don't try to grow up too fast, he'll never get to have us back" She explained.

"Thanks Cortana, you better go Shepard will kill you if your late" Beta smirked.

"Hey don't you dare start, no one knows your my brother yet," He was about to interrupt. "And you got squad leader, like me, like Dad and like every other one in our large family we have to keep secrets now excuse me I am staying at a normal family for a while"

Deca grabbed her duffle bag giving her brother a hug and rushing out to the main hall where Shepard was waiting with his suitcase as he frowned at her bag.

"You can pack more if you want" He said.

"I don't own anymore stuff then what is in here, moving around so much stopped by parents from getting me stuff, Mum didn't even tell Dad she had been pregnet until a year and a half after I had been born. Biggest shock when he came home from a mission that took nearly over two years" Deca shrugged.

Shepard decided to tease her a little. "We get married and have kids, if you get pregnant first thing you do it tell me!" He said making her halter.

"Deca?" He asked stopping to look at her.

Deca shook her head "It's silly"

"Tell me" Shepard grabbed her hand leading her to the pelican that would take them to Shepard's home.

"I...I never fantasized about those things when I was a kid so I just...don't think about it now" She answered a bit shocked. He wrapped an arm around her.

"Trust me my mother is going to give you an earful when we get there so start! And Emily wll be just as bad" Shepard said.

"Oh god! You think that's bad, wait until you see my family" Deca cried.

"Why? What are they like?" Shepard queeried.

"Oh, super strong and bloody tall! Scary, Happy, sometimes machine like. But they are as close to a normal family as they can get when they are raised as soldiers from birth" She described her family.

And like what her uncles aunts cousins like the twins because their family was in the SPARTAN II program and other various family members were like. Definitely not what he thought happened at a normal family. How she described their holidays were funny, but when it counted they could see the way they loved each other. Shepard smiled.

"You must really love them" He said.

"I do, we take care of each other just as we always do"