So here's another that follows the same vein as the last, at least in tone and such—I guess I hadn't gotten it all out of my system. Super sappy and a bit sad. Takes place roughly three days after the previous chapter.
"Do you ever think about what it would have been like, if things hadn't happened the way they did?"
"Mm?" Kaidan blinked slowly, refocusing his attention from the rain that raced into the white sand and onto the words she'd murmured against his chest. He internally ran through them once more and his dark brows drew close. "What do you mean?"
Her legs curled up onto the porch swing and over his lap, a purely Eve Shepard action—nothing Commander Shepard about it.
"I mean, do you think about how things would have happened had we met under less… dire circumstances?"
"No," he replied simply. At her inquisitive glance up to his eyes, he elaborated. "I don't think about it because I really can't imagine it any other way. Who knows what could have happened? All I have are the facts."
"That's very rational EDI-esque thinking," she said with a soft chuckle.
"Doesn't mean I don't think about things I might have done differently at a few points in our history," he continued. His arms tightened around her involuntarily as the memories flickered by. "But… I'll always remember falling in love with the hot, badass woman who had more balls than the entire Alliance fleet combined as she took on the biggest threat our galaxy has ever faced."
It was Eve's turn to blink slowly. "…Thanks?"
"No problem," he smirked, planting a kiss on the top of her head.
She considered this for a moment before sending another questioning gaze his way. "What would you have done differently?"
A long sigh wafted through his lips. "Horizon."
It was a long-dead horse, but she couldn't quite quell the slough of questions that single word conjured. "What about it?"
"I'm sure you know the answer to that already, Shepard," he muttered, brown eyes falling back out to the beach. Three days of rain had the waves in turmoil, but it seemed to be gradually ebbing.
"Humor me."
"For being such a badass with all those balls, you sure can be a girl sometimes," he teased, affection coloring his raspy timbre.
Shepard snorted. "I can still knock your teeth in."
The idle threat went unanswered, and the air around them took on a heavier quality. She knew him well enough to know it was something he still had trouble thinking about, and he was struggling to find the right words.
After nearly a minute, his voice barely reached her ears over the sound of the rain against the porch roof. "I tried not to think about it so much, you know… after the Normandy was destroyed. I didn't want to imagine you still with me. About the future we might have had. I couldn't stop it sometimes, of course, but I had to fight with the images every damn day."
They both knew he was watering it down, molding it to fit inside the most innocuous words he could manage. They'd come a long way, the hand they'd been dealt a little easier to accept every day, but he still struggled, especially on acknowledging her death out loud.
A light kiss against his neck told him that she understood everything he wasn't saying.
"Once the rumors started, though…" he began again, his voice a little stronger. "Well, the thoughts came on more rampant than ever." He cleared his throat and absently began combing his fingers through her cropped blond locks. "I thought about what would happen if it was true, and if I saw you again. Pretty soon, I stopped fighting it and gave in, imagining the things I would say and do… but then it was true, and you were in front of me… and I was too damn blinded by my own allegiance to my job to get past that Cerberus emblem on your armor."
Eve said nothing, but waited, well aware that he still had yet to truly answer the question. She wouldn't push.
With a humorless chuckle, Kaidan shook his head. "I always thought I'd… pull you into my arms and hold on forever, even if the whole damn place was crumbling around us, because nothing could be more important than that."
"Well, you at least did the very first part," she offered, extending him a little levity.
He smiled against the top of her head, placing another featherlight kiss there. "I let go too early," he mumbled in her hair. "Reality chose to set in right then and I was just… stupid in my anger. But if things had gone the way I wanted… hell, we probably would have ended up making love right there on the battleground."
Her eyebrows shot up with amusement. "In front of my crew, Kaidan? That's very bold of you."
"Hey, I figured I'd have had an excuse with the two year old grief and everything," he argued. "Besides, in my fantasy, we're too frantic to make up for lost time that we can't quite make it to a secluded corner somewhere." He shrugged. "And I assumed they'd probably walk away pretty fast once they knew what was happening."
She laughed heartily, indulging in the idea for a long moment. "I don't know. Mordin tended to have a very clinical fascination about the workings of every species' reproductive and recreational practices. He might have stuck around. You know, for science."
"That's… a little creepy." Kaidan conceded with a grimace, making Shepard laugh again at the unease in his tone.
"Yeah, he made the days interesting, to say the least," she sighed, her laughter tapering off to a quiet chuckle. There was no member of her team that she hadn't come to love dearly. Thinking of the Salarian had a bittersweet sting. Clearing her throat, she nuzzled Kaiden's neck, urging him on. "Keep going."
He dropped his hand from her hair and gingerly stroked up and down her upper arm. "I never really got much farther than that."
"How shallow," she said, a smile playing on her lips.
She knew he was grinning without even seeing his face. "Well," he went on, "I knew we'd talk… but it's all very abstract. I could never figure out exactly which way the conversation would go. I wondered if you still felt the same way about me, or if things had changed since you'd been brought back. I didn't even know if you'd be the real you, with the same memories and feelings and standards… I tried not to think too hard on that." He released another sigh. "But… when things went my way in the fantasy, you were as happy to see me as I was to see you and we just sorta fell right back into place like nothing had ever changed. There was a tearful reunion and a passionate exchange of 'I love you's, and all that sappy business." She could feel him shake his head ever so slightly. "But I screwed th—"
"Shh," she interrupted, raising a gloved hand to gently place a finger against his lips. "No, just stay in the fantasy. Don't shatter it."
He kissed the finger before very carefully pulling her hand down and holding it against his chest. "I could never really figure out how I would tell you everything I'd been through in those two years. No words seemed strong enough to express the pain I was in, and how much I'd needed you and hadn't realized it until it was too late. And how I'd never, ever take you for granted again."
"Kaidan," Eve whispered, her voice failing her. She tried again, a modicum more volume forcing its way past the lump in her throat. "I don't think you ever really took me for granted. We knew the stakes. You were with me the whole way, and you did everything you could to protect me."
"Bullshit," he bit out.
"I made you leave," she said firmly, grasping his face on both sides and forcing him to meet her eyes. "You know I wouldn't ever let anyone else be responsible for me, or make choices that decided my fate for me. If I did, I wouldn't be the person that you love. You were respecting me when you left."
He had to concede that she had a point, but it didn't make the memory of the ache any duller. He only nodded once.
"Go on," she urged, letting her hands fall once more.
Gritting his teeth, he tried to force the unexpected wave of emotion away and continue. Swallowing, he spoke again, his rasp more pronounced than before. "I'd have told you that I was never going to let you out of my sight again. I can't decide your fate, Shepard, but I can decide mine. If it meant dying with you next time, I was going to do it."
The thought brought a jolt of agony through her, but she had to accept that it was his choice. In a way, she could appreciate the sentiment.
"I probably would have proposed to you right there," he finished, a smile making its way into his voice.
She hummed with mirth. "Before or after our public romp amidst Collector corpses?"
"Hm… maybe during."
"Oh, heat of the moment kind of proposal." She snickered. "Those are the kind we're always warned against accepting, you know."
"You sayin' you would have turned me down?" he asked, leaning his head back to send her a skeptical look.
"Not saying that," she hedged.
He breathed a laugh. "But not saying more, huh? Anyway… that's about it. Of course, I always knew I'd ask you about your experience… if you were okay, if you remembered anything… but I think that part of the fantasy always scared me. I was afraid of what the answers would be. Too many variables. Especially when it came to the part where I asked for your forgiveness."
"You wouldn't have needed to," she told him quietly.
"I would have asked anyway," he returned.
Shepard indulged in another sigh. "Well, do you feel better now?"
He peered at her curiously.
"Well, you've more or less accomplished everything in that fantasy," she clarified. "Though it maybe didn't play out quite in that fashion or order… we still ended up here. And I even accepted your proposal."
He smirked. "Yeah, I guess I can't deny that I'm happy now. Who knows where we'd be if things hadn't happened that way?"
Eve nodded. "It probably would have been a lot different. And… well, I wouldn't have come to know Thane the way I did." Her green eyes automatically sought the ocean vastly splayed out before them, her chest tightening.
"Yeah," Kaidan murmured, kissing her temple. "The poor bastard sounds like he deserved you a lot more than I did then. He deserved to be happy for those last few months."
"I hope he was," she breathed against the wind.
"He was, Evie," Kaidan uttered against the shell of her ear. "He had your love. That's enough to make the saddest son-of-a-bitch this side of the galaxy sing show tunes."
Her lips curved in a phantom smile. "You're biased."
"A little. But it doesn't make it any less true."
The rain slowly trickled to a stop, and Shepard swallowed hard, eyes never leaving the shore. "Thank you, Kaidan."
"For what? Being honest?"
"No. Yes." She shook her head, trying to coax the perfect words to the surface and finding only insufficient ones. "For just… understanding. For not being the jealous prick that I think a lot of people would be. For accepting his place in my heart and not faking it for my benefit."
"I can't fault anyone for being in love with you, Shepard." He told her simply. "As we've established, I didn't exactly handle our reunion with grace. And above all, I only want your happiness. After everything you've done, you deserve it. I wasn't in a place to provide that for you then, as much as I wanted to think I was. But he was, and I can't hate him for it. Like I said… who knows where we'd be if things hadn't happened this way?"
A brilliant smile danced on her lips and she finally brought her gaze back to his handsome face. "I was thinking the very same thing the other day when you asked me to marry you. That in a way he helped to bring me here, with you."
"Then I think we should have a toast to him at the wedding," Kaidan stated with a decisive nod. "Speaking of which… did you break the news to Garrus about the dress?"
A guilty laugh broke from her throat and she shook her head. "Haven't mustered the courage yet. He's likely to snipe me all the way from Palaven. I'm going to call everyone today, though."
Kaidan accepted this. "I told my mother yesterday. She started crying."
Shepard couldn't fight the momentary wince. "Is that a bad thing or a good thing?"
His smile was as warm as sunshine. "A good thing. After Dad… she was happy to have some good news in the family, even if it's hard to imagine her only son getting married without him there." The sadness only just tinged the edges of his deep brown eyes. The contrast against his smile nearly shattered her heart.
"Oh, Kaidan," Eve whispered, arching up to press her forehead against his. "I'm so sorry."
"Thanks, baby," he replied in a sotto voice. "But I'm okay. He wouldn't want us to waste time mourning him. He'd want us to keep going like we are."
Taking a breath, Shepard made a reluctant effort to peel herself from his lap and get onto her feet.
"Hey, where you goin'?" he protested with an exaggerated frown.
"Gonna go for a run since it stopped raining and make all the calls while I'm out."
"Well, stay within earshot so I can at least hear if Garrus decides to take a shot at you."
"Will do, Major," she grinned, blowing a kiss his way as she jogged down the patio steps and tapped her omni-tool to life.
He winked at her before she tore off down the beach and watched her for several minutes, the echoes of her laughter contagious as she spoke to Garrus. He found himself smiling just by proximity of that breathtaking sound, once so painfully scarce.
Finally, he turned his eyes to the horizon where the clearing skies met the glimmering jade sea.
"Thank you," he whispered reverently into the breeze. "I'll make her happy."
Now I can't promise that this will be the last I go into the Thane/Shep relationship, but I felt the need to hear it from Kaidan's mouth before I felt I could really close that up neatly. Surely there will be mention of it in whatever chapters I may write later in this series, but yeah… a little more closure was in order. Thanks so much for the reviews. And to Shenkoshipper who wrote in unlogged and left me a very, very inspiring review. That's probably what convinced me that I could effectively continue in this little realm of post ME3 happiness.
Feedback is always welcome!