A/N: I have clawed my way out of my writing slump to create a (belated) birthday present for the amazing Gothicthundra!
This falls into the canon of my 'Shego's backstory' fic, but you don't need to have read that. And this was supposed to be a drabble-ish thing, but...since I do not know how to end fics at all, it turned into a whole...thing. So... :P
Happy birthday, friend! Hope you enjoy. :)
Drakken tiptoed closely behind Shego, nervously grasping and rubbing his fingers as they approached the darkened warehouse.
"Shego..." he whispered, and then caught his breath as she stopped suddenly. He couldn't help but bump into her.
"Would you stop hovering?" she hissed without turning, her attention focused upward.
"But you told me to stay close!" he whispered back, looking up to follow her gaze. "What are you looking at?"
"Armed guards, up there. They'll probably try to double-cross us."
"Nyeh..." He recoiled slightly as he narrowed his eyes, but was still unable to see what her experienced eyes did. "I don't like this... Can't we just go back to the lair? It's not too late to change our minds."
"Ugh," Shego said with a roll of her eyes and continued forward.
The warehouse door was ajar, as they had been told, and Shego slipped inside with Drakken close behind her. There was a distant light source, but it did little to illuminate their steps as they started into the building with crates of varying stolen goods piled over two storeys high.
Drakken bumped into Shego again as she suddenly stopped, but before he could react she had turned to him and put her hand over his mouth. His eyes widened as she leaned in close, her nose almost touching his.
"Remember the plan?" she asked, her voice barely audible.
He nodded.
"And remember the plan if they cross us?"
He nodded again.
"Good. I do all the talking. Here they come," she said.
Drakken was suddenly aware of approaching footsteps, and when Shego turned back to meet them he saw figures emerging from the darkness all around them. Men and women, dressed all in black, with one woman standing out among them and leading the way. She was also dressed in black, but rather than clothes meant for work and stealth she wore an attractive suit and heels that clicked on the floor with her steps. Her bone-straight dark hair was nearly a match for Shego's in length, and a smear of red lipstick was the only color on her face.
"La Jefa," Shego greeted, her tone indicating respect and mutual expectation. But Drakken knew it was farce.
"Why so formal, Rachel? Surely old friends like us don't need any pretense."
Drakken watched the slight tensing of Shego's frame that gave her away, and he desperately wished he could see her face. But she had insisted that he do only what she instructed in this new style of crime she had gotten them into, for both of their safety.
"...All right, Guadalupe," Shego said. Drakken heard her holding her breath. "I can see you have the goods."
The crime boss smirked and casually gestured over her shoulder to the stocked warehouse. "Fifteen tons of crystal. I have my distribution list in my office, along with your payment. Are you ready to take possession?"
Shego cleared her throat lightly. "The trucks are outside. How about you and I take care of payment while Drakken supervises the loading?"
La Jefa's eyes narrowed ever-so-slightly. "Of course."
A quick command in Spanish got all of the other black-clad men and women moving, hurrying to forklifts and throwing open the warehouse doors. Drakken backed away from the increased activity until he ran into a tall stack of crates against one of the walls. He frowned lightly at his own clumsiness, and when he looked at Shego again she was walking alongside the black-clad woman whose arm was around her shoulders.
Vehicle headlights suddenly cast beams of yellow light across the floor as the rigs driven by his henchmen began entering the facility. Likewise the lights of the forklifts began moving around the building as they started picking up crates to move into the trucks.
The plan was happening just as Shego had arranged it, with almost no help or intervention from him. And he was content to leave it that way. Smuggling drugs from Central America throughout the USA had been Shego's brainchild. He was against it from the beginning, but she insisted that they needed some form of steady capital and that she was well-connected to certain circles. She had never explained how exactly, but clearly she went back a long way with this particular crime boss.
Perhaps it wouldn't be quite so dangerous?
It was true, after the Lorwardian defeat and their decision to lay low and to slow the world-domination schemes until they were out of the public eye, the funds had been scanty. And Shego didn't like to live cheap. And she liked being idle even less. He had noticed, that the longer he didn't have a plan the more dangerous styles of evil she tended to want to be involved in. It made him wonder how much of her was in the business for the thrill, and how much for the power and recognition. He knew he was definitely more keen on the latter.
"Hey, güey! How many trucks?"
Drakken blinked at the man suddenly addressing him and took a moment to find his voice.
"Seven," he answered. "Is...that enough?"
"Sí, güey. Eso es bueno."
Drakken cocked his head to the side at the unfamiliar word in the man's speech, but had no chance to ask as the man turned and started giving orders to the others. The last truck was entering the warehouse and the first had parked where directed and his two henchmen were opening the door to give the forklift access.
Drakken wondered how long the loading would take, and glanced to the staircase where Shego and the other woman had vanished. Up a single flight he saw a lit window in a small office, and he could make out the silhouettes of his sidekick and the crime boss moving within. He would feel much more comfortable as soon as Shego was back. And when he saw the cash they were being paid for moving the drugs.
The worker who had addressed him before passed by again, and Drakken called out to get his attention.
"Hey, um...Sir."
"¿Qué es, güey?" the man asked in annoyance.
"I was...just wondering how long you think this will take?"
"Oh, oh, solo un momento. It will...be over soon."
The man grinned evilly, and then turned to walk away with a laugh.
Drakken felt his gut twist at the sinister look on the man's face. He knew the look well as he often bore it himself. He felt in his pocket and pulled out the signaling device he had built for he and Shego to alert the other to an emergency. He glanced down to make sure he had it turned on, and then the sudden revving of an engine pulled his attention back to the darkened warehouse.
He had barely a moment to draw in a choked breath as a forklift carrying a heavy crate drove straight toward him. He stumbled to his left and out of the way to avoid being crushed...but he wasn't completely in time. His right arm was caught at his shoulder joint and pinned completely between the crate and the wall. The signal device was likewise pinned as his fingers were bent at odd angles and completely immovable.
The cry of pain that roared out of him was loud and wild enough to wake the dead, let alone alert everyone in the building to his plight. And then he screamed again. It felt as if the crate had been dropped on his arm at the same time it felt like blades were trying to sever his fingers at each joint and in fact his whole arm at the shoulder.
He screamed a third time, this time managing a barely coherent "help!" at the end of it.
The forklift driver had leapt out of his vehicle and was now standing alongside the other man he had addressed. They were laughing as they walked toward him.
Drakken's heart pounded as he tried desperately to keep his breathing even as every flinch increased the pressure and pain on his shoulder. He realized that any movement could be the difference between keeping his dominant arm, or losing it.
"We were told to kill you, but this perhaps is better, ¿sí? You can watch La Jefa destroy your organization."
At that moment, the sound of breaking glass was followed immediately by a green blast that sailed through the window of the small upstairs office and hit a crate on the closest shelf. Drakken swallowed and forced himself to keep still. He might not be able to use the signaling device, but they didn't need to anymore.
Suddenly, a shout from the back of the warehouse sent the two men in front of him running and the sounds gunfire began echoing through the darkened building. Drakken might have smirked in satisfaction, but the pain in his hand and shoulder was too great. His vision was starting to swim, and the panicked thought hit him that if he fainted he might slump into a position that would cause him to lose his arm.
He tried lifting his other hand to pull on the crate, but the mere movement of adjacent muscles to those of his pinned shoulder caused them to sing out in pain again. He forced himself to breathe slowly as he listened to the gunfire and saw the flashes strobe on the wall opposite him, and the occasional green flash from above.
At least, he thought, they stood a fighting chance. Shego had insisted on hidden compartments in each truck for armed henchmen. He hadn't been terribly keen on the idea of getting his men into a fire fight either, but Shego had stolen the guns in advance of even telling him that he would be building the compartments.
He resolved then that if they survived, he wouldn't ever be so idle in evil-doings that things resorted to drug smuggling and casual violence ever again. It just wasn't his style.
A black-clad man stumbled back into view and then hit the ground and lay motionless, a stain of red on his chest providing the explanation for his fall. Drakken tried to move his fingers to at least unfold them and alleviate some pressure, but it only made the pain in his shoulder worse.
He realized then that a tingling was sweeping his entire arm, shoulder, and part of his chest. His fingertips were starting to feel cold.
"Help!" he called powerfully.
The only answer was gunfire. Though he noticed it was becoming less frequent. He wondered who was winning.
At that moment, a rapid movement pulled his attention upward where he saw Shego exit the office and flip down over the railing and to the floor. Teeth bared, she ran headlong toward the action that he couldn't see from his position.
"Shego!" he shouted.
She glanced in his direction and then skidded to a stop, her eyes wide. With a snarl and a sudden drop to the floor, she fired three quick green blasts at something beyond his sight, and then she ran up to him.
"Shego! It's crushing me!" he cried, his voice sounding wild and foreign to his own ears.
She was already staring with calculating eyes at the spot where his shoulder and arm vanished behind the crate. Without even looking at his face she turned back and leapt into the cab of the forklift. And a few moments later, he felt the pressure release. The pain however, remained.
He cried out in pain again as he pulled his right arm against his body with his left, the former only responding to commands at the elbow. But even that sent more bursts of pain into his shoulder and his wrist.
Shego was suddenly at his side again, and her fingers were cautiously running over his right hand that still held the signaling device. She ran her fingers over each of his in turn, and then carefully unfolded them. He cried out again as the tingling began to subside and the pain increased, the cold having gone. The signal device clattered to the ground.
"I think only one of them is broken," the level voice of his sidekick broke into his frantic thoughts of pain, pain, pain.
"...My shoulder," he panted a moment later, and her hands immediately went to the tingling, aching, burning area. He couldn't really tell what she was doing, but he was aware that she was touching and prodding the area around the joint that still felt as if a blade were pressing into it.
"Let's get out of here," she said.
He blinked and finally brought his eyes up to meet hers. Her expression was angry and cold.
"Hospital?" he gasped.
"Maybe," she answered. "The lair first. Good thing it's close."
She turned and starting jogging backward toward the exit, her eyes going to the battle that was still occurring on the other side of his temporary prison. The gunfire was all but gone now, but he was aware of small bursts every ten or so seconds.
"Plan C, boys!" Shego called out. "Don't forget the cash!"
Drakken blinked at where Shego stood guard, her hands conspicuously inactive. He realized it was to make them less of a target as they made their escape. He took two steps forward and then stopped with a hiss. Even walking hurt his shoulder.
"Come on!" Shego urged him with a growl. "The longer we stay, the less likely we'll get out!"
Drakken grit his teeth and strode forward, knowing a jog was utterly impossible. Just walking was torture.
When he reached Shego's side she began backing out of the warehouse alongside him, watching their retreat. She'd glance over her shoulder in front of him every few steps to make sure there wasn't an ambush waiting for them outside. But Drakken thought it unlikely, as apparently...
"We're winning?" he asked as they hit the open air.
"Oh yeah," Shego said, tossing him a pleased smirk.
Drakken couldn't find any mirth in him to join with hers. He only cradled his arm tightly against his side and tried to step carefully as they made their way to the hover car.
It was only a minute before they were safely inside, Shego piloting as they left the urban area and headed for their temporary lair just off the coast. Drakken cautiously began running his left hand down his arm to his hand, where the pain had lessened a bit everywhere except in his pinky finger. He assumed that was the one Shego had decided was broken, though he wasn't ready to rule all of them out.
He even more cautiously moved his hand upward, pausing at his elbow to feel the joint. It was a bit sore, but had been protected somewhat due to the bulk of his shoulder taking most of the weight of the attack. He carefully brought his hand up to his shoulder and began prodding.
Every touch brought pain, light and heavy alike. And when he dared to try to lift his arm away from his side the pain that erupted there caused his breath to catch.
"Probably shouldn't move it till we can get a better look," Shego said.
He glanced at her, but she was focused on the dark skies ahead of them.
"...What happened to La Jefa?" he asked after a moment.
"She's dead."
Drakken turned his head to look fully at Shego—an action not without pain. Her expression was still angry and cold.
"Before you ask, it was gonna be her or me. She had planned to double-cross us from the beginning. Which I guess is obvious now... Unless you stepped behind that forklift?"
Drakken frowned. "No."
"Didn't think you'd be that stupid."
Drakken sighed and continued supporting his right arm with his left.
"I told you it was a bad idea."
"Hey, we're still gonna get the cash."
Drakken felt anger rising within him along with the pain that wasn't decreasing. But he bit down on the words that wanted to leap out of him in a flying rage. He didn't want to anger her further and risk losing her help with the state his arm was in.
The rest of the flight was spent in silence, and when they reached the small cave lair he had put together she immediately resumed ordering him around as she had been doing of late.
"Okay, get out of the coat and then after we get an idea of how bad your shoulder is I'll splint your finger and we can decide what to do next."
Drakken grumbled as he unclipped his belt and slowly pulled his gloves off, his right hand throbbing with the action.
"Come on, hurry up."
"Um, perhaps you forgot, I was nearly crushed behind a forklift! I thought my arm was going to be severed!"
"But it wasn't," she said without missing a beat, moving behind him and starting to pull the coat off of him once he'd unbuttoned it.
"Stop!" he protested the pulling of the fabric against his shoulder.
"It's got to come off," she said behind him.
He grumbled again as he let her first help him out of the left sleeve, and then more slowly and with care out of the right. He could see his right hand and arm now for the first time in his short-sleeved t-shirt and saw that his fingers and elbow were bruised, and two fingers were swollen.
Shego started pulling at his shirt and he turned to face her.
"What are you doing?" he growled.
"Trying to see your shoulder," she answered, her eyes fixed on the spot concealed by his black shirt.
He realized then that her eyes hadn't really met his since before they ever arrived at the warehouse. And thinking about it as he let her pull his shirt over his head and slowly down his arm, he hadn't really seen her eyes since just after the Lorwardian defeat.
Whatever he might have wondered about her though was put on hold as he finally saw his shoulder. It was completely black and purple, bruised over the entire humerus and joint with dark tendrils snaking onto his chest. There were also spots of bright red in a few places. But other than that, he couldn't see any external issues.
"Try moving it."
"It hurts," he complained.
"Hospital it is, then," Shego retorted.
He glanced at her face and saw her cold expression. He remembered her words about La Jefa, and wondered again...just what was going on in her head?
He lifted his shoulder slightly to the side and was met with a sharp, stabbing pain. He tried forward and found the same result in that direction, as well as backward. He scarcely moved it an inch in any direction.
"Can you move it any farther?"
He tried and discovered, painfully, that he could. Though he didn't like it.
"All right... Let's immobilize it and splint your fingers. If it's not any better in the morning, we can hit the hospital."
Shego turned and headed toward the cupboard with the emergency aid kit. Drakken studied her stiff posture, the downward angle of her head, and then her vacant eyes when she turned back toward him with the gear.
"...Thank you," he said, when she drew near.
She seemed to be startled and met his eyes for a moment. He glimpsed the briefest sight of the Shego he remembered from before the Lorwardian invasion. But she vanished almost immediately.
"Sure. Whatever," she said, as she went to work splinting what they had both decided were two broken fingers while he carefully worked his arm into a sling.
"Shouldn't I put my shirt back on?" he asked as he struggled with the stiff cloth.
"You'll just have to take it off again. Use an extra blanket if you get cold."
An alarm began sounding from the small workstation he had constructed. Shego ran ahead of him and turned on the monitors while he followed more slowly, clutching his arm.
"The henchmen are back," she announced as he reached her side, and before he could draw a breath she was gone again, to open the 'garage' he assumed. He watched the arrival of a single truck on the security cameras and frowned before turning to follow her. A strange fear began gripping his stomach, akin to the one he'd felt when he'd been pinned to the wall at the warehouse.
As he descended the staircase that would lead to the garage, he the sounds of distressed voices reached his ears. Demands, shouts, and moans hurried his steps until he reached the landing and his jaw dropped at the chaotic sight before him.
Shego was only ten feet ahead of him, likewise halted by the action. Wounded henchmen were stumbling around the back end of the cargo truck, the door of which had been raised. Some of the red-clad men were carrying others and laying them out on the floor, while others still were left supine and unmoving inside the massive truck. Many of the red uniforms were darkened with bloodstains, the sight of which made Drakken's gut twist.
One of the henchmen had been addressing Shego, but either she didn't answer or the hired hand didn't like her response because he suddenly moved around her and rushed to stand in front of Drakken.
"Boss, what's the emergency number here?"
"Ahh..." Drakken's mouth was slow to respond as the continued groans and the spatter of darker red across the henchman's shirtfront arrested his attention.
The taller man in front of him yanked off his goggles and hood and leaned in closer to Drakken's face.
"Come on Boss, we've already lost six guys!"
Drakken snapped back to attention at the sight of the man's desperate blue eyes and sweat-dampened hair.
"Ngh, engh...try 911!" he finally gasped out. "Shego!"
His sidekick slowly turned around as the henchman fumbled for his cellular phone.
"Don't just stand there! Try to organize a triage! I'll...I'll let the authorities know where to find us," he said, turning back toward the stairs. He had a transponder in the hover car that might help.
When he was halfway up the stairs, he heard the familiar annoyed voice of the woman who continually confounded him amid the groans of pain.
"Did you at least get the money?"
Thirty minutes later found all but three of his henchmen either shuttled away by ambulance or air-lifted to the nearest emergency-equipped medical centers. Drakken sat heavily in his desk chair as he finished his lie-laden report to the obviously suspicious police officer. Shego was nowhere to be seen.
When the officer left, with a promise to be calling soon to follow up, Drakken looked at the three traumatized-looking henchmen who had hovered in the background since the departure of their injured fellows. The blue man rose from his chair with a wince of pain at the slight movement of his arm.
"Take tomorrow morning off," he told the men, "and...we'll regroup once we know how everyone is doing."
The henchmen melted away to elsewhere in the cave and Drakken stood in silence for several minutes, alone for the first time that night. He found himself drifting back down the stairs to the garage, where the truck was still parked with its back door open. Blood still stained the floors and gave a smell of death and decay to the room.
Drakken wondered suddenly about the state of the drug lords they had partnered with and been crossed by. Would they call for help too? Had any survived? How many of them were bright-eyed men just trying to earn a dollar for their families?
He shook his head and headed back up the stairs, wincing with every step. One of the ambulance drivers had tried to convince him to go to the hospital too, but he insisted on the henchmen being taken care of first. He didn't want to take away any of the emergency resources from them.
When he reached the makeshift office, Shego had returned from wherever she'd disappeared to and was leaning over the computer monitor.
"Shego," he began evenly, though he felt anger suddenly building from deep in his chest. "No more plans like this! I told you it wasn't worth it."
She turned to face him, arms crossed, her face still bearing the cold expression it had for countless days now.
"We still got the money," she said.
Drakken's jaw slackened momentarily before his expression darkened into rage. "At what cost!? Six of my men are dead!"
"Guadalupe lost more," Shego said with a shrug, turning and walking away from him toward the tiny corner of the cave that had become a kitchen.
"And you..." Drakken hesitated, "you killed her."
Shego glanced back at him, slight annoyance entering her eyes. "I told you, it was her or me. Would you rather I'd died to maintin some weird moral standard you have?"
Drakken opened his mouth to retort, but no words came. He wanted to believe it was just self-defense, but the cold look in Shego's eyes and the smirk she'd sported as they'd backed out of the battle in the warehouse suggested otherwise.
"In case you forgot, we're villains, Doc. Evil villains. Villains who do evil things. Killing is one of them. And if we lose a few henchmen..." She shrugged and turned away from him.
Drakken felt his skin crawl at how calmly she spoke the words, made all the more unsettling by the fact that she was now preparing a cup of tea. He stepped up in front of her.
"We've always had rules. They keep us from doing something...too costly. Like this. The henchmen are people, too."
Shego dropped the tea bag on the counter and faced him, hands on her hips.
"Look, Doc, if you want to keep existing in this weird limbo now that you've gotten a taste of hero-worship, you go right ahead. But don't expect me to go along with it anymore."
The anger in Drakken's chest turned to ice as a familiar fear crept along his nerves until even his aching fingers were tingling.
"What are you saying?"
"I'm saying...I'm not going to sit around and do nothing anymore while you 'lay low.' I can't do it. I have to do something."
Drakken thought quickly. "We can keep...doing evil things. But we can't be irresponsible about it."
Shego turned back to her tea preparations.
"Sometimes that's the only way to live."
Drakken felt some of his anger returning.
"Taking life for granted?"
Shego put her cup of water in the microwave and set it for a minute and a half, the tea bag and sugar packet waiting on the counter next to her. She was facing away from him, and he saw the tensing and subsequent relaxation of her shoulders in the next few moments.
"Life doesn't mean anything, anyway," she said quietly.
Drakken frowned. He reached across his chest and undid the fastenings on the sling and slowly slid it off of his arm and let it fall to the floor. He felt a slight chill over his bare flesh at the slight loss of warmth.
Shego had turned around at the sound and was now frowning at him. "What are you doing?"
Drakken began lifting his injured arm and clenched his teeth against the pain. He stepped forward until he was face to face with Shego and slowly set his arm around both of her shoulders.
"What are you doing?" she repeated, her gloved hands moving to his chest to provide some separation between them.
He leaned down and placed a soft kiss against her lips. His eyes remained open and he stared without focus at her shocked expression, her eyes meeting his as he let his lips linger against hers.
When he pulled his face away she pressed lightly on his chest, but his small wince of pain stopped her. He let his arm rest more heavily around her shoulders as he measured his breaths against the pulsing and stabbing pains in his flesh and joints.
"I took my right arm for granted. But I could have lost it tonight. Then I never...would have been able to do this," he said. "And this means something."
Shego let out a shaky breath, her stunned expression belying nothing of whatever thoughts she may be having.
"I can't take life so lightly, after everything that's happened."
By the sudden, distant look in her eyes he knew she was remembering the alien invasion as he was. He seized the opportunity and leaned down to kiss her again.
Just as the first time, their eyes remained open and staring without focus at one another. The microwave beeped, but Drakken ignored it and moved his lips against her soft ones. His left arm moved to circle her waist and his hand rested on her hip as he held her slim form against him.
She pulled her face away suddenly and gasped in a breath.
"What are you doing?" she asked a third time, her voice now a plaintive whisper.
The cold anger had finally gone from her eyes, replaced now by shock and fear that had her gaze trying to rest anywhere but on him. When her eyes reluctantly found his again, he lifted the uninjured fingers of his right hand to run them through her hair just the few inches he could reach. She glanced over anxiously to the movement, and then back to his face.
"Making life mean something."
She started to shake her head, but he kissed her again. This time she responded, closing her eyes as her lips answered the movement of his and a longing hum emerged from her chest. But almost immediately she pulled back, shaking her head again.
"No. What are you doing?" she asked, looking up at him, some of the fire returning to her eyes. "You've never... Since when are you interested in me like this?"
Drakken's right arm had begun to tremble from the effort of keeping it up around her, and he hurriedly let go of her and reached around to grab it with his left hand to keep it from falling.
Shego stepped back as soon as he had a secure hold on his arm, eyeing him suspiciously. But a rare compassion filled her eyes upon seeing the pain on his face. She set one hand on his elbow to give his arm more support, and then with her other hand gently lifted his injured one up between them, lightly massaging his palm with her fingertips.
He looked at her with a hint of surprise, but then his face set in determination. "I need you."
Her eyes lifted to his, but then darted away in fear, a coldness entering them again.
"But I don't need you...coming up with suicide plans for small amounts of cash, and not caring about the henchmen, and—"
"I care about the henchmen," she interrupted.
He looked down at her seriously. "I need you...the way you've always been."
Shego frowned. "What are you, a masochist? I insult your intelligence and bail when a plan goes south. You could have died at least three of the times I've left before."
Drakken felt a wave of uncertainty hit him that he knew showed in his eyes by the return of confidence to hers. But he shoved it aside.
"You came for me."
"Huh?"
"On the Lorwardian ship. You came for me. You didn't have to."
Shego looked nervous. "...I'm your sidekick. It's my jo—"
"You just said it. You bail when a plan goes bad. We both know you only came because you wanted to."
Shego carefully let go of his arm, making sure he had it supported, and then crossed her own.
"So what?"
"So...I think you need me too."
Shego rolled her eyes and turned around to open the microwave.
"Puh-lease. As if."
"Then why are you still here?"
Shego set the now-cooled mug of water down and looked back at him, her posture stiffening as her expression became guarded.
"We've been idle for months. It's why you came up with that...horrible drug smuggling plan. You don't need me around to do evil, Shego."
His words were insistent, and perhaps a bit too forceful. His heart was pounding in fear as he knew that a few responses were potentially coming. One, her attacking him. This was less likely considering his injured state; despite her recent tendencies she rarely kicked a dog when it was down. Two, her giving him some sort of tongue-lashing. That was the most likely. And three, the one he feared most, was that she would just up and leave right then.
But she'd been right about one thing at least. Being idle was out of the question, after what had happened that night. He'd nearly lost an arm, and if he hadn't moved so quickly he'd have certainly lost his life. He had to take the risk and break the awkwardness and lack of communication that had been between them since the invasion, though why it had started he still didn't know.
She took a breath, and he tried to gauge which response was imminent by her expression...until the inexplicable happened.
Tears started filling her eyes. She gripped the edge of the counter as her jaw set tightly, and she stared straight down at nothing until two tears slid down her cheeks. She blinked twice, and several more tears joined the first two.
"Shego?"
She took in a sharp breath. "Why did you kiss me?" she asked, her eyes fixed downward.
Drakken thought of the moment scarce minutes ago, marred by the pain in his arm as he had stubbornly laid it around her shoulders. He lifted his good hand up to scratch the back of his neck as he shrugged his left shoulder awkwardly.
"I...um... Eh-heh..."
She finally looked at him sideways, annoyance and anger dominating her features and made all the more intense by her bright, red-rimmed eyes.
"So you don't like me? I mean, you're not interested in me like that?"
Drakken thought of the impulsive act that had been more subconscious instinct and desperation than anything else in the moment it occurred. He remembered the feeling of her lips both in the awkward moment that they had stared at each other in mutual shock, and in the moment when she had begun to give in.
He looked at the woman standing in front of him. She was hunched over in insecurity, hair wild and unkempt, bags under her eyes and face puffy from crying. He let loose again the imaginings that had once plagued him until he locked them up tightly, of holding her in his arms and simply listening to her laugh and of the elation her smile could bring him.
It wasn't worth the risk, he had told himself for years. Better to have her as a sidekick than not have her at all. But one glance at his black and blue shoulder that still burned in pain easily shut down that argument as it had minutes earlier.
"Yes," he said, hoping his voice didn't sound as shaky as it felt. "I mean, I am."
Shego clearly hadn't expected that response. Her eyes widened and she seemed to stop breathing as she stared at him fully, seemingly searching for the lie or misunderstanding.
And suddenly, Drakken knew.
"Shego...are you in l— Ah, hhm," he cleared his throat loudly and feigned a cough. "Are you...interested in me, like that?" he finished, using her words.
He saw her jaw tense as her entire frame seemed to go rigid. Tears continued falling down her cheeks. He stepped closer and her eyes lost focus as she stared straight ahead and blinked several times to rid her eyes of the tears.
"Is that why you came for me? Is that why...you're still here?"
She used the heel of her hand to wipe her face, and he heard her mumble something about 'acting stupid.' He moved his left arm around her waist and pulled her close, and her hands rested on his chest again. He let his right arm hang uselessly at his side.
Shego looked up at him anxiously and shook her head. "Are you for real right now? You've never... I mean, you didn't even make a move those three times you had me under mind control."
The fear looked strangely out of place in her eyes, but it was something he was used to feeling. It made him oddly more at ease.
"I need you. And...I want you," he said shakily. "And I can't assume I'll get another day to wait...and hope that things just happen."
He felt her hands slide farther up his chest, one of them up to his neck where she pulled him ever so slightly closer.
"S-since when are you the risk-taker?" she asked, her eyes darting away anxiously as she attempted the comfortable banter.
"Since I almost lost my arm to back-stabbing drug lords," he said matter-of-factly.
She blinked at him in surprise, and a smirk ghosted over his face. This time, she met him halfway when he leaned down to kiss her and the passion she greeted him with sent his head reeling. It could have been minutes or only moments—he had no idea which—as a blinding white fire and ecstasy overtook every aspect of his being. He was aware of his fingers digging into the flesh of her waist and of her tongue meeting his in an electrifying battle and dance. But everything suddenly vanished and brought him back to the darkened cave when he forgot about his right arm and lifted it to put around her.
"Aahh!" he cried, backing away until he leaned against the counter, clutching his injured appendage tightly against his side.
A moment later when he had caught his breath and looked up, a myriad of emotions were still playing across Shego's face. They finally settled into concern, and she picked up the sling he had dropped from the floor and helped him carefully get his arm back into it. The minute passed in silence, and as she was securing the portion of the sling that wrapped around his waist he saw a hint of a smirk at the corners of her mouth.
"You didn't need some macho display of pain tolerance to kiss me," she said.
He felt a tiny prick of embarrassment, but continued on with his new honest-and-risky way of talking to her. "I really did...want to do that, in case I still lose my arm."
"You're not going to lose your arm," she said emphatically, looking up at him with an expression that said the discussion was over.
"...If I'd moved any slower, I'd be dead. He was trying to kill me with that thing."
Shego's expression sobered completely.
"Guadalupe tried to kill me with an overdose."
"What?"
"A needle with pure meth. Actually...you saved me. I was counting the money, but I heard you scream. When I turned around she was right behind me."
Drakken likewise felt a healthy fear at the thought of what could have happened. He set his left hand on her arm and looked down at her seriously.
"It's not worth it," he said, shaking his head. "We can't do something like this again."
She glanced down guiltily for a moment before steeling herself and looking back up. "I know."
"Six of the henchmen are dead!"
"I know!" she snarled.
The high wall she'd had up around her emotions having now fallen, he saw that she was as devastated as he was by the loss. His rising anger vanished and he lifted his hand up to her face but hesitated.
"Is this...um...can I...?"
She answered by stepping forward into his touch, and his thumb rubbed gently under her eye where a single tear had fallen again.
"We'll...go visit the others at the hospital in the morning," he said with resolve.
"And get your arm checked out."
"Mmm..." Drakken hummed, looking at his blackened shoulder again. The pain hadn't subsided at all. He'd simply been distracted for several minutes and ignoring it.
"And come up with a better excuse if the police start to suspect us that doesn't contradict what you already told them," Shego continued.
"Oh. Right," Drakken said. He bit the inside of his cheek, remembering how Shego had insisted her plan was flawless.
His hand was still cupping her cheek, and when their eyes met again it was with equal question and uncertainty. Shego was the first to look away and grab another mug out of the cupboard.
"Want some tea? I don't know about you, but I'm not getting any sleep tonight."
Drakken nodded. "Mm, probably not," he agreed as she filled the second mug and set both inside the microwave.
"We can watch lame sitcom reruns and infomercials," she stated more than suggested.
"Or telenovelas," Drakken said.
She glanced at him. "You speak Spanish?"
"No. Do you?"
"Nope. Telenovelas it is."
"Perfect," Drakken said, turning and heading in the direction of his bedroom in the small cave.
He felt Shego's eyes on him and glanced back to where she stood watching him with an anxious expression.
"I'm cold, I'm getting a blanket," he explained.
She turned back toward the microwave and he continued on in his task. He was walking slower due to each step causing pain in his arm and now his back, for which he was suddenly grateful because it gave him more time to process his thoughts.
He truly hadn't planned to kiss Shego. It had just...happened. Nor had he intended to confess to his romantic interest in her. He had previously resolved to never tell her. But now...she was also interested in him?
It seemed too good to be true, contrary to the nightmare they had both just lived through a few miles away at La Jefa's warehouse. But if it all meant he got Shego back and pulled her out of whatever strange mental state she had been sinking into, he was fine with the development, no matter how awkward.
After retrieving his blanket, he entered the 'living room' of the cave where Shego was setting their two steaming tea cups on the 'coffee table'—an overturned cardboard box—and sitting on the small, cheap sofa. It was quite the contrast to the lair they were used to deeper in the Caribbean.
"Sit on my right," Shego said as she began flipping channels on the small, static-laden TV. Drakken quickly understood that the request was so his injured arm wouldn't come in contact with her and could rest safely.
He sat down and spread the blanket over him and started tugging it up over his shoulders at the same time she found what appeared to be the Spanish version of a daytime soap opera. She set the volume much lower than he would have, unless he'd been sitting there in silence for a long time, and then she turned to look at him.
He glanced at the TV screen again, but then focused on her. She seemed to be waiting for something. But as was typical, impatience won and she moved to sit next to him and looked up at him with slightly narrowed eyes.
"So...what are we now?"
Drakken thought about the question. It briefly crossed his mind that she meant professionally, but he knew to voice that would end badly for him. She definitely meant personally. And he felt his usual anxiety around her start to return.
"Ah...we...what do you want us to be?" he asked, turning it over to her.
She shook her head, setting her hands on her hips. "This kind of thing only works when the people agree on it."
"Right..." Drakken said, looking at her stern gaze that just barely concealed her own anxiety. "Um. I think..."
He looked at how she was sitting straight up, measuring her breaths, and clearly waiting for him to make the first move. He wondered just how long she had been waiting.
"I think we should probably...talk about it more?"
She glanced away briefly, seemingly made more apprehensive with his answer.
"But," he continued and lifted his left hand to beckon her closer, "I...I need you with me."
She moved closer to him, still looking a bit anxious as she watched his face. He set his hand on her arm for a moment and then brought it up to her face to cup her cheek.
"Shego... Rachel," he said softly, and he felt the first prickling of tears behind his eyes. He took a breath to banish the sensation. "Please...come back to me."
He watched the war of confusion and fear that began on her face. Her expression switched back and forth between all of the things he was used to seeing in her, as well as the cold detachment and anger that had been her norm as of late.
His hand still on her cheek, he gently tried to pull her closer to him. Her eyes moved to focus on his as she responded to the touch and moved in. Fear, the one thing he was so unused to seeing on her, was the dominant look in her eyes. He was surprised suddenly when she crawled over his lap, her legs on either side of his as she hovered over him. And a moment later her hands were on his face and her lips were kissing his.
He ran his fingers through her hair as he returned the kiss, effectively answering her question from before with the intimate touch. Drakken was aware of the TV running somewhere in the room, but all his attention was given to moving his lips in time with hers and trying to get enough air to breathe.
Her hand suddenly gripped his right shoulder and he gasped and jerked away from the sudden pain. The movement caused even more pain, and as he cried out in agony he watched her face twist in frustration and anger, apparently with herself. She wrung her offending hand in the air and then fired a green blast back over his head into the wall. She then set her hand on her own thigh as if imprisoning it and after flipping her hair over to her left side, her lips fiercely attacked his again.
There were still many questions that needed asking, but they were quickly being forgotten by Drakken as a mixture of pain and pleasure overrode his senses, the green woman fulfilling every dream he hadn't even known he'd had. But when her lips traveled across his jaw and to his neck, he had a flash of common sense.
"Wait, Shego," he said, pushing her back slightly, gasping still from the pain in his shoulder and the lack of oxygen. "I'm...very limited on mobility right now."
She looked at his arm, and the intense determination in her eyes gave way to frustration. With a growl of annoyance, she carefully moved off of his lap and leaned into his side instead. He was glad she got the point, but he could see in her eyes that she was still fixated on a certain goal.
"Could you hand me my tea?" he asked, not wanting to do anything to disturb the volatile woman.
She blinked, and then lifted his cup forward until he could grab the handle with his left hand. He sipped the warm liquid gratefully and realized his lips were already a bit swollen from the intense attack Shego had laid on them.
He felt her sigh heavily and lean into his side, which ordinarily would have made him panic. Now...he was grateful for anything that wasn't the strange, cold person she had been turning into over the past several weeks. He sipped the tea again and then moved his arm around her, holding the mug carefully away from her.
He looked at her face and was dismayed to see the detachment and what he realized was probably depression beginning to return. He thought quickly, and then kissed her forehead long and soft.
She looked up in response, a question forming in her eyes.
"I need you," he said, heart pounding as he thought desperately. "I want you. I...I've always wanted you."
He watched in relief as a light started to come back to her eyes.
"You have?"
He nodded. "You're everything I've always wanted."
Her eyes dilated, and he knew she was fighting back tears.
"And I'm...I'm willing to take the risk. Two near-death experiences is enough. I can't waste time anymore."
She curled her legs under her and pressed further into his side, and then pulled his blanket back up over his right shoulder from where it had fallen. She took his tea cup from him and set it back on the cardboard box, and then one of her arms slid around his waist and the other up behind his neck.
Now at eye-level with him, her hand lightly pushed his face toward hers, but he hesitated at the look in her eyes. There was still some fear and anxiety, but also...a small hint of happiness he didn't think he'd ever seen before. The cold anger was gone.
"Shego?" he asked hopefully.
"Neither...neither can I," she said shakily, answering his earlier statement.
He leaned forward before the hope could vanish and found her lips again. This kiss was softer, causing warmth and light to bloom in his chest. It was so euphoric, it almost made him forget about the pain in his arm.
When she pulled away, breathless and grinning shyly, he smirked.
"I thought we were watching telenovelas," he said.
Her hand on his waist tightened slightly.
"That's what we're doing," she said.
"Is that what this is called?" he asked, his grin broadening as he watched her face return to the smug, devil-may-care expression that had first attracted him to her.
"Mmhmm," she said, leaning forward and setting her face against his.
"Oh. Well, then..." he cleared his throat, "I've missed this whole series. I need to catch up."
The fear had all but left her eyes, and the smile that brightened her face sent his heart racing in elation. She seemed to be back. And now...everything could be better than it used to be. He would never take a single moment with her for granted again.
"I know all about this one. I can help," she said, the last being muffled as her lips met his again. He kissed her back fiercely, and she hummed contentedly into his touch.