A/N – I am fully prepared to duck rotten fruit after this chapter, but take heart, loyal readers. This chapter is brutal – it was very, very hard to write – but I refuse to leave things like this, so I will be uploading all four chapters in this angsty arc tonight. Please forgive me, Shenko fans, I promise this won't last!
Before I leave you to it, a quick thank you to everyone reading and reviewing – I am so glad to see/hear that my story has kept you interested and entertained. It gives me the fuel I need to continue this journey of healing until our ME has said what they have needed to say and will finally leave me in happy peace~
He thought she was sleeping. When Kaidan entered Shepard's room a few moments after Joker left, he took a moment to pause and survey her, as was his custom. She was lying silent and still, face turned away from the door, and he initially took the lack of motion to indicate sleep. Then he noticed the subtle signs – the set of her shoulders, the tightness of her jaw, the slight hitch in her light breathing – that told him he was wrong. Not asleep. Kaidan took a deep breath and walked to his chair, ready to confront whatever new enemy had caused his love the stress her body posture was telegraphing so eloquently to the person that knew her best. He greeted her with his standard "hey there" as he sat down and was more than a little alarmed when she didn't acknowledge him. In fact, nothing in her manner indicated that she had even heard him.
He leaned forward to take her hand and tried again. "Hey, Shepard, what's up?"
He saw it in her eyes when she opened them and looked into his. She was pissed. The angry that smoldered in the deep green pools had him inhaling sharply in surprise. "What's wrong?" he questioned her.
"What's wrong?" she repeated in a low bitter tone, spitting his words back at him like she would lob a grenade in a fight. "How could you keep this from me? How could you fail to mention that the Savior of the Galaxy is also a person who committed brutal genocide and murdered her friend? What part of our plan to do things better this time around allowed you to abuse our relationship that way?"
Kaidan winced at the accusations, although he knew that in strict definition, everything she said was true. The problem was that her vitriol had reduced things to fact with no context to temper the harsh reality. He was a firm believer in context. He'd had to learn that truth in a very harsh lesson on Horizon two years ago. He sighed and tried to think of an explanation that wouldn't make the situation worse.
"I didn't abuse anything, Shepard," he told her, refusing to rise to her anger, deliberately keeping his voice calm and level, "I did what I did to protect you. I love you. That gives me the right to want to protect you, doesn't it?"
"At least you're not denying it, not lying about it," she bit out in a growl. "But did you forget who I am? Kaidan, I don't need you or anyone else to protect me!" She was breathing rapidly now, and her voice was beginning to rise in anger. She wasn't shouting – yet – but he was sure their argument could be heard by anyone passing outside the room.
"When you love someone, Shepard," he replied, still in a quiet tone, "you don't protect them because they need it. You do it because it's as instinctual as breathing. So sue me if my first thought upon you wakening wasn't 'gee, I should tell her about EDI and the geth' instead of 'thank every god I've prayed to for three weeks for giving her back to me.' Forgive me if the thought of losing you again, even on an emotional level, had me scrambling to shield you from the more painful aspects of your victory." On her flinch, he continued, still in a level tone, but beginning to feel some of her anger rising within him, "And most of all, forgive me for being so shortsighted that I see it as a victory, despite the cost. I know you, Shepard, I know you wouldn't have done things the way you had if you had even one other viable option."
She stared at him, still vibrating with anger, but there was surprise there now, as well. He wondered if her surprise was due to his speech or the fact that he was unwilling, for once, to back down from what he believed, even for this woman. He would maintain his belief that she had done what was necessary, even if she herself wasn't willing to see it.
She sighed, angry, stubborn. "You shouldn't have done it. You were wrong."
"I'd do it again, exactly the same way." He replied.
"What if you're wrong, Kaidan?" she flung the words at him in accusation. "What if I did have choices and that was the one I picked anyway? You still love me then?"
He looked at her, sharply, trying to read her face, trying to figure out where she was going. Other choices? What did she mean? He wasn't sure and he knew she was in no mood to enlighten him. Still, her question deserved an answer. He gave her the only one he could, "Yes. When you love someone, you believe in them, and you respect their choices and decisions, even when you don't agree with them." This, he felt, was the heart of the matter. Perhaps she didn't agree with his decision to keep the harsher facts from her, but he had done it out of love, and she damn well would respect his reasons.
Shepard seemed to have understood the double meaning behind his last words, if her weary, resigned sigh was any indication. Still, she wouldn't be Shepard if she surrendered peacefully so he wasn't surprised when she came back on the attack. "Like you did for me after Virmire? Or on Horizon?"
That, he thought, wincing, was a direct hit. Trust Shepard to know how to wound him deepest.
"I can't say I've always done or said the right thing, Shepard," he told her quietly, in a pained tone. "But I can say that I've learned from my mistakes and I refuse to keep repeating them."
"Strange," she flung back, but in a lower tone now, more depressed and resigned than angry, "you're still here."
Kaidan figured there was only one response he could give to that. He stood up and quietly left her room.