"I thought I told you to meet me in my cabin?" Shepard said; crossing her arms over her chest.

"Yeah, in an hour; it's only been like 10 minutes." Cass replied, rolling her eyes.

"Just go, now." Shepard responded uncrossing her arms and pointing to the stairs behind her; Cass, letting out an irritated groan, complied, nearly stomping out of the sub deck. Jack sat there unamused; turning back to the datapads on the floor in front of her. Shepard, running a hand through her hair, turned to back to Jack, "I... sorry, about that. I hope she didn't bother you." Shepard said, not wanting to step on the biotic woman's toes; turning back toward the stair and starting to walk away, Shepard stopped as Jack replied.

"It's fine; she's okay; for a kid." Jack mumbled; not even looking up from reading.

Shepard did a double take before; walking up the stairs, shaking her head; of course her child would want to hang out with the crazy ex-convict…

Entering her cabin, Shepard found Cass spinning in her desk chair; completely oblivious to her mother's presence. Throwing a hand onto the chair back, Shepard grabbed her child with her free hand as Cass very nearly tumbled out of the seat.

"Oh. Hi, I was just-." Cass trailed off, watching her mother's face grow stern. What had she done now?

Shepard stood above her seated child; crossing her arms, she began, "We need to talk; starting with you spending time with Jack-"

"I was only down there for a few minutes!" Cass interrupted, "And you're the one who went to rescue her, she's gonna be on the ship; shouldn't I, like, make an effort-"

"Cassandra, I am the one who needs to make the effort, not you. You are a child, one that isn't supposed to be hanging out with someone like Jack."

"Wow; hypocrite." Cass sassed, rolling her eyes.

"What did you just say?"

"I said you're a hypocrite!" Cass exclaimed; her temper rising, "You can't drag me along on this ship with you and then bring all these other people along and say I can't be around them! You might as well lock me in a storage locker, if that's how you feel!"

"Cassandra." Shepard sighed; bringing her hands up to rub her temples. This wasn't what she wanted to talk about. Relenting; the commander began, "Fine. I see your point. I'm being a little unfair-"

"A little?"

"Yes. A little unfair. But this isn't what I want to talk about."

"But-"

"No. Not now. We need to talk about what happened earlier, on purgatory." Shepard stated; kneeling down to be at eye level with her daughter seated at the desk; looking at her expectantly.

"Well, I… I just…" Cass looked down; not wanting at all to talk about what happened, her anger subsiding.

"It's okay Cass; just tell me, take your time." Shepard said gently.

"I, he was aiming at you… and I just, I shot him. I killed him…" Cass mumbled; eyeing her hands resting in her lap; she could feel her cheeks growing wet.

Shepard raised her hands to her child's face; wiping away the stray tears with her thumbs. "I know it's hard; honey, the first time is-"

Cass shot up from her seat; and whipped around to face the commander, yelling; "IT wasn't hard! It wasn't hard at all and that's what scares me! I was ready, right after, I was ready to do it again. It was so easy!"

Cass began pacing the length of the desk; putting her head in her hands; Shepard, watching her child so distressed, felt so much hurt for her daughter, she knew the feeling; she had been there, but she had been older, around 19, maybe 20. And she was prepared and trained for it; Cass was not. Grabbing her daughter mid-pace, the commander pulled her into a hug; "It's okay. I know. I know."

Cass stopped; allowing herself to tear up in her mom's arms; shaking with a few restrained sobs.

"I'm sorry, mom, I'm so sorry." She mumbled into her mother's shirt.

Shepard could only hold her daughter tighter, as she finally heard what she'd been waiting for.

"So…?" Cass mumbled sitting up to face her mother from the bed; Shepard sitting at her desk; mildly concentrated on the console in front of her.

"So?" Shepard mimicked; questioning.

"What does this all mean? I mean, after, what I did, where does that leave me? Us?"

"Well, Cass, I'm not really sure right now. You seem capable, but you're young; you're my kid. I hardly want you in the line of fire; but I'm sure that if I wasn't here, you would be in a year or two." Shepard paused to think, raising a hand to push her hair back; then continued. " Right now, it's just a lot to process. And before we go anywhere with this, I want to you talk to Yeoman Chambers; because I am not going to let you go anywhere without being cleared by her. What happened on Purgatory is a big deal, Cassandra; you don't just walk away perfectly fine; you're not fine. It takes time to deal with things like this…" Shepard trailed off, looking up from the computer; smiling at her child she added, "Besides, you're still technically grounded."

"Mooooom." Cass whined; throwing her body back down in the bed.

AN: (So the new Final Fantasy is pretty good; a lot better than the other two in my opinion) Here's another one. Still looking forward to hear other's idea. I have a pretty good one for when Grunt comes along in the next couple of chapters. Until next time!