The door slams open, and the Commander barges into the room, a little girl with pink hair being pulled along behind him.

"HONEY! I'M HOME!"

"Sensei?" Helena looks up at the Commander.

He pats her head absently. "Shhhh… we're not in Abydos anymore."

Helena's brow knits, unsure what that means, but complies with his request.

"Who the hell…" A woman's voice comes from the adjacent room, and Helena watches as a tall lady in a nice suit with hair pulled into a severe bun walks around the corner. "Ah."

"I have arrived!" The Commander crows. "THis right here, this is the fruit of our love!"

Kalina looks down at Helena for a second, then back at the Commander. "Er…"

Helena suddenly recalls the Commander's words when they were on the train, that the Commander used to love a woman very much and gave her a special hug and that's how she ended up in a lab. Some of it doesn't make sense, but the Commander saved her from the nasty men, so he's a good guy.

Which means, this is her momma?

"Momma!" Helena raises her arms up.

Kalina's eye twitches. "...Commander?"

"Yes?"

"Why the f-" she glances down at the small girl. "What the hell have you been teaching her?"

"Well, if you're going to make up a child to try to baby trap me, then I have every right to do the same!"

Kalina stares at her former Commander for a few seconds, jaw working without any sound coming out. "I… Don't even know where to start with that."

Helena's face falls as she realizes something is wrong, even if she can't quite put her finger on it. "Um… Sensei? Why is Mommy mad?"

Kalina takes a moment to collect herself, and her tone smoothes out as she crouches down next to the small girl. "Hey, do me a small favor, okay sweetie. Can you do that?"

"Um…"

"She can't do-"

Kalina's arm reaches out and she slaps the Commander on the dick, sending him hopping around clutching his nads and cursing under his breath. "Please?"

"Okay." Helena nods.

Kalina waits for the pink haired girl to walk in and spot the last occupant of the building before shutting the door. She's spent some money to get this place manufactured, so the door should be soundproof…

She takes a deep breath before turning to the Commander. "What. The actual. FUCK. Is wrong with you?"

The Commander stops hopping and instead starts to squirm in place. "Hey, you started it! You said you had a kid, and I know that's not true. We only had sex, like, a dozen times!"

Kalina puts a hand on her hip. "It only takes once and a bit of luck, idiot. And I do have a kid."

"Well I do too." He crosses his arms, then crosses his legs slightly to protect his nads from another assault. "From the same day."

"Commander?" Kalina gives him a death glare that works just about as well as it had a decade ago. Namely, it doesn't work.

"What?" His brow furrows.

"You're a man, unless you transitioned when I wasn't looking. And judging by your beard…"

"So?"

Kalina does her best to tamp down the screaming in her mind. While he could occasionally show sparks of brilliance, her Commander was, unfortunately, functionally brain dead. He only joined GnK to get laid, and only learned tactics so he could keep getting laid. It sucks, because sometimes he uses those combat tactics to charm women.

Happened to her once or twice. Or twelve. Fortunately for both of their careers, it only works on a very select pool of women and T-dolls.

"Commander, think. Do you have the capability of giving birth to a child?"

The lightbulb finally turns on behind his eyes. "Oh, right! No wonder." He thinks for a moment. "Should'a said she was my girl with another woman… but then it wouldn't be relevant to you-"

"Just… shut up." She sighs. "Alright, time to rip off the bandaid. Commander, follow me."

"Eh? Uh… sure."

Kalina pokes her head into the office and the COmmander can immediately hear the sound of two children laughing, giggling to each other.

It's a pleasant sound to his ears, he's always liked kids. That's because it's his sacred duty to create more-

Wait. Two?

He follows Kalina inside the room to see something that makes his heart stop.

A tiny Kalina. A tiny Kalina, but with green eyes that match his. She looks up at him with an inquisitive look.

"Commander, meet Sofia." Kalina crouches down next to her mini and hugs the girl across her shoulders before pointing up at the stunned man. "Sweetie, this is the Commander. Remember the pictures I showed you?"

"Uh-huh." Her eyes go wide. "That's Daddy?"

Kalina nods.

Sofia walks right next to the Commander, head at his stomach level as her eyes turn straight up to look at him. "...Daddy?"

The Commander's brain crashes like Calhoun's did when he described the way he screwed that ELID. It doesn't make sense, but like… Kalina would know if she gave birth to someone, right? And, she looks identical… and as far as he knew there wasn't any other guys that Kalina was fucking-

"Hey Kalin-"

"Kalina."

"...Fine. Kalina. Who else were you seeing when we were doing it back in Griffin?"

"Nobody." She growls. "As I recall, it was you who was cheating on me with thirty dolls, not the other way around."

"Uh, it wouldn't work the other way around, Griffin only hired female dolls." He nods. "I would know, it's why I went with you guys instead of Sangvis. Boy, was that a stroke of luck, huh?"

"Sure. In any case, I have the proof on my computer. I had tests done because I knew you'd try to weasel out of this."

"Yeah, sure. Let me see the tests before you start forcing her down my throat."

"What, like you did to me?"

"Uh-"

"Follow me." She walks over to a laptop and starts loading the files she had sorted out in anticipation of his arrival. He was supposed to get here a few hours later, but just as well. "Here, read through these. If you need the verification data, please access this account."

The Commander nods and starts to skim through the paperwork.

Kalina looks over at the two little girls playing together and chatting excitedly about… about…

Well, it sounds like medical machinery, but since it hurts her soul slightly to admit her daughter doesn't have the most conventional of upbringings, she's going to assume they're just playing doctor.

The safe kind of doctor.

"Hurry!" Sofia suddenly stands up and points. "Nurse Helena!"

"Yes!"

"Fetch me the scalpel! We must dissect the ELID before it takes over this city!"

"Yes, Doctor Sofie!" Helena runs into the next room.

Sofia turns to the table and seems to be studying an invisible corpse. "Now, we need to engage the momomolekooler cat-hood beam to keep the ELID in check."

Monomolecular Cathode…? "Sofie, sweetie… where did you hear those words?"

"Auntie Persica!" Sofie's eyes light up. "She sent me a lot of weird books with lotsa pictures and words I can't read. I've been searching them up on your computer-"

She claps her hand over her mouth much too late, and Kalina has to avoid letting her anger and exhaustion show through. "Sofie, what have I said about accessing my computer without my permission?"

"I'm not supposed to." She hangs her head.

Kalina crouches down. "Next time, let's read these together, and I can help you, okay?"

"Okay." She brightens up. "You're not mad?"

"No, just disappointed. Remember, my computer password is only for emergencies."

"Okay momma."

Helena runs back in, a trowel in her hands. "Doctor Sofie! I have located the scalpel!"

"Excellent!" Sofia rubs her hands together. "Now, we must cut off her leg to stop the spread of infection!"

"Aye aye!"

Kalina looks back over at the Commander, who seems to be fixated on one of the documents. "Something the matter?"

"Eh?" He snaps out of his trance and glances around, eyes finally fixing on Kalina's intense stare. "Uh… right. So, you're the one who provided the Helena job?"

Kalina blinks. Whoops. She was supposed to delete those documents.

Oh well. "What of it?"

"Well… the case Helena came in was keyed to my handprint." He spins in the chair to face Kalina straight on, opening his mouth to say something before once more shutting it.

"Okay, so?"

"Well, I was thinking-"

"A dangerous proposition. Maybe you should stop."

Ignoring the warning in her tone, just as he always had, he plows on. "In this report, it says that you sent some genetic samples from me, you and Sofia to the lab."

"That's correct."

"Two vials of saliva and a semen sample."

"Yes." She folds her arms and taps one arm with her opposite hand. "Your point?"

"Well, this was sent in 2065." His brow furrows. "And I stopped seeing you in late 2064. How'd you get a semen sample?"

Ah.

He continues as Kalina's face freezes up. "And like, how do you still have my handprint on file? That's weird, you shouldn't have access to GnK data anymore, and it's not like you should have had access to it in the first place."

"It was on file publicly. Somehow."

The Commander notes her tone is dead flat, but continues with his last bit of train of thought. "Right. Ignoring the massive security hole that leaves, the last bit of something is that… well…" He glances at the kids who are now both writhing on the ground hollering about turning into ELIDs, and lowers his voice. "We always used condoms, right? You insisted."

"Those aren't perfect."

"But they are most of the time." He points out. "And I know how to put on condoms correctly so they don't leak, if I didn't, I'd have more kids than Ghengis Khan."

Kalina balks slightly. "How many-"

"Well, I suppose I didn't use them with the dolls, but only a few of them have wombforce installed. Mayling keeps installing one onto Groz for some reason, but-"

Kalina grabs his face, shutting him up. "Maybe one of the condoms ripped?"

"No, I always got the rugged ones. And the one time it ripped, I wasn't anywhere near ready to bust so you shouldn't have been able to get pregnant."

Kalina's sapphire eyes dim to black. "Hey Commander? Stop thinking about this. Last chance."

"But…"

"Shhhhh." She puts a finger to her lips. "Hey look, isn't Sofia cute? Why don't you go talk to her?"

"...Okay." He stands up and walks over to the pair of girls, who subsequently lash out and each bite an ankle forcing the Commander to give out an unholy shriek.

That was close. If he kept prying, he might've found out about the doctored condoms she had meticulously prepared with pinprick holes, or the enhancement drugs she had been spiking his coffee with, or her used condom collection, currently with only a few dozen samples from a decade ago.

Despite herself, her tongue wets her lips. With any luck, she'll be able to expand her collection in the near future.

Ah, Commander… Finally, after all this time, he will be hers again.

Or else.