James wiped the coffee from his face with his napkin as Anne tittered lightly. Shego meanwhile sat there in shock, too stunned to say anything after that glorious spit take, her mind whirling.

Mom? Mom!? What the fuck?!

James started chuckling at the situation, amused that such an innocuous statement would have such a dramatic effect. He folded the paper and rose to his feet. “Guess I’m going to need a new shirt and tie.”

Mom!?

“Shego? Are you okay?” asked Anne, a bit concerned for her daughter-in-law. She had meant the comment as something playful, not as something that might actually cause the young woman distress.

Mom?!

“Shego?”

Mom? Was she okay with that? Could she call Anne that, knowing the connections she had to the word? She was going to be a mother herself soon, one as utterly unlike her own as was possible if she had anything to say about it. Could she accept that there could be differences in mothers though? Anne was nothing like her own mother and Shego really did like her. She was like Kim, only older and a bit more focused. It wasn’t easy but maybe she could give this a try and if it didn’t work, well…what would she actually loose? “Sorry…Mom…I guess I was a bit stunned by that. My…my own mother was not a good parent so I have some issues with the word.”

Anne rested a hand on Shego’s shoulder in understanding. While her own parents were decent she knew all to well that there were many who were not. That Shego had parents like that wasn’t a surprise but was something she wanted to correct. “Shego, you’re my daughter-in-law. I accept you for who you are and how you make my little bubble butt feel.”

Shego snorted. “Bubble butt?”

Anne smiled, “What? You didn’t think Kimmie cub was the only embarrassing thing we had to call her…right?”

“Well, I guess I did.” Shego shrugged. That nickname was wonderful and again could be used well if she timed things right. “I really don’t know much about her yet.”

“Well, I do have the day off. Want to talk about things and I can show you Kim’s baby pictures?” It was a peace offering and Anne figured that the pale green skinned woman would jump at the chance.

“Really? That sounds nice.”

Kim knew something was up when she saw her mother sitting next to her wife and her father no where to be found. She narrowed her eyes in accusation and both faces looked at her with utter innocence which only served to make Kim even more paranoid. “What are you two planning?”

“Nothing…yet.” replied Shego, in the same taunting tone she had used with Kim time and time again. “Why, should we?”

Kim grumbled as grabbed some breakfast and ate, still staring at the pair as if they would attack or do something else at any moment. When she left for school she was worried about what was really going on but no clues had been given and she was sure she would find out upon her return, which wasn’t all that comforting. If only the two had said or done anything that could have given the teen hero a clue as to what diabolical plan the pair had been up to. It made her whole day difficult as she tried to think of something that could make them both look so…pleased.

Once Kim had left and the door clicked shut, Anne smiled over at Shego, “So, want to see some pictures?”

“Absolutely.”

KPKPKPKPKP

Shego was looking through some brochures on various area homes that had similar amenities to the Possible house to try and find something that might just work for her and her Princess. She did like some of the nice things available in many of them, but a few of the available houses just didn’t look right to her. Something about the architecture just set her teeth on edge. She was going to another set of plans when she heard the door slam. “Princess?”

“GAH!!” Kim stormed into the house and threw her book bag onto the stairs. This worried Shego, who had rarely seen Kimmie this upset about anything and an upset Kim only led to bad things in her opinion.

“Kimmie?”

“GAH, I fucking HATE fucking Bonnie Rockwaller. God damn bitch needs to get hurt. I should have just punched her in the face.” ranted Kim, as she stalked back and forth in front of Shego, who was still sitting on the couch. The dark haired woman had one eyebrow quirked up and was fascinated by the foul language coming out of her wife’s mouth. Apparently Bonnie was not a friend.

When she couldn’t take it anymore, Shego reached out and grabbed the pacing teen, pulling her down onto the couch and into a hug. “What happened?”

Kim growled and then said, “Somehow Bonnie found out that I was pregnant. For all I know she has a friend or flunky or something in the office who overheard, regardless she found out and went onto the attack. She has been making various jokes about trailer trash and such all day and she also noticed the wedding band, mocking me about what poor schmuck did I pay to knock me up and then dragged into some joke marriage to save my honor. I…I just can’t take it any more. I hate her so much and just want to get her out of my hair once and for all.”

Shego held onto Kim a little longer as she though about what the green eyed girl was saying and ran a hand through the red hair, trying to calm her down. It was partially working. “Do you want me to take care of this Pumpkin?”

This stopped Kim’s ranting immediately. “How?”

“Well, I would threaten her until she understood that getting on your case wouldn’t be in her best interests.” calmly explained Shego, figuring that getting Kim to focus on something else briefly would kick start the girl’s brain again. Sometimes she got so fixated sometimes, which was good in a fight but not so good for everything else.

Kim gasped and tried to pull away, shocked by what she had jut heard, but Shego didn’t let her go. “You’d threaten her? But Shego, that’s illegal and could get you in trouble. GJ could arrest you and then I’ll never see you again.”

Glad that Kim was starting to think again Shego responded, “Well what do you want to do about this then?”

“I wonder if I can just sue her for harassment? If I get a tape of her saying those things to me, would that work? Do you think that might shut her up once and for all?”

“You know Kimmie, if you have a tape like that, even the simple threat of a lawsuit should stop her. If she wants to give you grief just use her own temper against her, don’t stoop to her level. It should be easy to get her to threaten you and get it down with your phone thing. And it would really upset her to know that if she said anything she could be taken to court.” said Shego, thinking through things and trying to come up with a workable answer.

“That makes sense and it is better than beating her senseless, just maybe not as satisfying. It’s just that…I’m tired of people teasing me first because of the ring and now that the pregnancy is out. I don’t want to deal with some of these people. They just piss me off.” It was clear that Kim was quite upset about things and Shego really had no idea what to do to help Kim other than sharing her pain and the things the woman had learned through the years of her being teased.

“Kim, these people are just going after you because hurting you makes their miserable lives better. They think that if they can make you hurt then they will have less pain, which makes tem idiots. Deny them that and you can win, but it wouldn’t even be remotely easy, especially if they know what barbs really get under your skin. This Bonnie is probably just a sad person who needs to puff themselves up at the expense of someone else.” commented the older woman, drawing on her training in Childhood Development. “Just let them go on and on until everyone can see them for the fools they really are. I mean, you are better than them just by refusing to play the same game.”

“You sure?” Kim had a small voice, of a scared little girl who was being overwhelmed by things. It almost broke Shego’s heart and made her want to do some beating of her own. Maybe she should hunt this Bonnie down and teach her not to mess with her Kimmie?

Shego leaned forward and kissed her red headed partner on the forehead. It was amazing how much she needed the red head in her life now and in such a short period of time. Well, to be honest, she’d needed the teen in her life for a while now, just this time romantically. She reassured her love, “I’m sure. Just know that I will always support you, not matter what. I got to take care of my girls.”

Kim snuggled against her pale skinned wife and sighed, feeling a lot of the tension drain out of her. She didn’t want to face anything today, nothing untoward, no villains, nothing but to be able to stay in Shego’s arms. That was where her happiness lay. She was so tired, and her breasts were sore and she didn’t need any of this other crap. She just wanted to rest here where she was loved.

Shego realized that Pumpkin had fallen asleep against her, so she settled back into the couch, holding her wife carefully so she wouldn’t roll off onto the floor. She so wanted to threaten the little bitch who had said such horrible things about her wife and child but Kimmie had been right, Global Justice would certainly be happy if she broke the law in that manner. Giving the bastards such satisfaction would be pathetic and she wasn’t pathetic. No, she would just endure and make sure she was able to find legal ways to protect Kimmie in everyway possible.

Shego sat that way happily, holding Kim to her until the tweebs burst into the house, galloping up the stairs yelling. Shego doubted that they had even noticed the two of them there. Kim woke, blinking sleepily, rubbing the sleep grit out of her eyes. “Feel better Princess?”

“Yeah. I’m still pissed but I’m better.” nodded Kim.

Shego grinned wickedly at her awakening wife, “Want to spar?”

Kim perked up at that, eyes opening fully. She bounced just a touch as she asked, “Really?”

“Yes really, Cupcake. You look really tense and pissed off and I prefer you to stay relaxed as it is healthier for you and the baby, so you can try to hit me.” commented Shego.

“Try. I can hit you just fine.” groused Kim. “It’s just that I’d rather hit Bonnie.”

Shego smirked and got to her feet in one smooth motion. She stretched a hand down to Kim and helped her up, saying, “Let’s get changed and we can start our workout.”

It took Kim a bit longer to get ready than Shego but not by much, mostly her frustration slowed her down. The teen reached outside just after the pale green girl had and was a bit surprised by the thief beginning to stretch. “Uhm…Shego…aren’t we going to spar?”

“Sure we are, but this time you’re going to stretch first. I don’t want you to pull something or another, since from what I’ve read your body is going to be going through a fair slew of changes. And besides, if I let you get hurt doing this your parents will flay me alive and shoot me into space. So I am looking out for myself just as much as you.” Shego really hoped that Kim wouldn’t argue with her too much on this, as she was covering her own ass this way.

Kim grumbled, knowing the wisdom of what her wife was saying but wanting to be able to vent against her wife, who had fought her to a standstill for years. “Fine. Let’s get started.”

Shortly, however, Kim had to concede the wisdom of Shego’s point. Some of her joints and muscles had tightened up and she couldn’t bend at the waist as well as she should have, and she really hadn’t put on more than a pound overall at most. The stretching did warm her body up so Kim had to admit the point begrudgingly. The sparing also started out rather slow and built in intensity until both of the women were moving at much more familiar speeds and intensities. After they took a break, Shego stood looking at Kim contemplatively and the red head blushed self-consciously. “What?”

“I was just thinking that maybe you would be helped by some silat, something more positional than your more acrobatic stuff, because soon enough you won’t be able to flip like that.”

“What?” Kim was getting a bit confused by this.

“Well, Princess, sooner than you would expect, you’re not going to be able to do some of that stuff and if you couldn’t still fight you would get so whiney and I don’t need that. So I figured that I would give you a hand in finding something to help compensate and I thought of silat.” explained Shego. “That and I kind of want you to start using some sort of weapon, as that’ll keep people from getting too close to you.”

That gave Kim a pause. “A weapon?”

Shego seemed to get flustered. “Well, yeah. Look, I’m not talking about guns or something like that but maybe some escrima sticks or a jo staff or bo staff or tonfa or something. If they can’t get close to you they can’t really hurt you or our little girl.”

After a little bit of thought Kim had to concede that point. Fighting anyone but Shego made her nervous about the baby’s safety as only Shego would be able to fight her and not accidentally hit her in the belly. Maybe she should see if the suit Wade had made for her included armor, especially over her belly. “Okay. That sounds completely reasonable. I think escrima or jo staff might be the better options, since I am never sure how much space I’ll have available to fight in.”

“I could always get you a set of collapsible tools. I know of one set that converts from jo staff to escrima pretty easily and vice versa.” offered Shego. “And silat does work with the escrima sticks, though knives are preferred.”

“So when do we start?” inquired Kim, curious about this new martial arts style and looking forward to working with Shego.

“How about right now? Is that soon enough?”

Kim grinned happily.

KPKPKPKPKPKP

“Okay, so you have missed two periods and should be at about week seven. How are things going?”

“Not too bad. I have been much more tired lately and I can tell I’m slowing down in my activities which has been irritating. Also my breasts have been aching. When are we going to do an ultrasound?” inquired Kim after she had given her update.

Anne shook her head at how excited about that her daughter was over the ultrasound. She and Shego were sitting slightly back of the red head as she spoke with her OB-GYN. Kim had turned around 180 degrees from just a few weeks ago. The woman, Dr. Davis, chuckled at this. “Next week, we can do the first one if you want.”

“That’s spankin’!” exclaimed Kim, fairly keen to see what her daughter looked like, even though she knew that ultrasounds were not the most accurate in terms of how the kid really looked. They were more of a tool to ensure the overall shape of the kid was okay. She turned quickly and looked back smiling widely at Shego, who was smiling faintly, unsure about things, as being in the doctor’s office brought back bad memories and made this seem even more real. She really was going to be a mother. Kim really was carrying her child.

Kim on the other hand was apparently starting to actually enjoy things, as she had a wife who would protect her and a woman she loved all wrapped up in the same pale green body. Having a child in those conditions wasn’t as scary as it had seemed when this started a few weeks ago. She could do this now and she was kind of getting into the idea that she really was going to be a mother. Despite all the crap that Bonnie and a few other girls had given her this would be worth it in the end.

“Are you making sure to take your vitamins?” asked Dr. Davis, as if going down a checklist of things the teen needed to do in order to ensure a healthy baby.

“Yes and exercising and eating right. Oh, doc, about my missions. Is it okay to keep doing them?” asked Kim a bit worried. She loved going on missions and helping people and to lose that would make her just a bit stir crazy.

Dr. Davis sat there a few minutes and thought about things, knowing the kinds of things that the teen hero did. A number of them were dangerous and put a lot of stress on the body but Kim was in amazing health and had strong muscles to help resist the environmental impact of those missions. “I figure that maybe for another month or two, so long as you are quite careful, and try to avoid anything that involves pressure changes, like sky diving and scuba diving as much as possible. A little bit would be okay, but not too much. We don’t want to make the baby have to endure too much you know.”

Kim looked a bit sad at this news, even though she had been aware that there really was a time limit on her ability to do those things. She liked sky diving and scuba diving and having to give those up was not something she really wanted to consider, but if it was for the best then she really had no other choice, her baby needed to come first. “Alright. I guess I can do that. So I should just stop doing my missions at about week twelve?”

“Well, certainly stopping anything really dangerous, sure, but some of your more…tame missions I guess would be okay to about week sixteen. But you would have to be careful.” Dr. Davis gave her a smile.

“Okay then. So you want me to come in next week?” Anne just raised an eyebrow at Kim’s response and was amused at the zealousness with witch the girl was approaching her health right now. Usually Kim was so busy with other things that her health seemed like a tertiary concern. It was clear that Kim wanted the baby and for it to be healthy.

“If you want. Two weeks would do just as well. Then we can do the ultrasound. That okay with you?”

Kim nodded, a bit sad that it looked like it would be two weeks until she saw her daughter. “I guess that will be fine.” Kim turned and smiled at Shego and then cocked her head in thought. Shego had mentioned some health issues in carrying a child, could that be a problem here? “Uhm…Doc, what sort of genetic issues do you think my child will have?”

Dr. Davis blinked in surprise at the question. So far as she knew there had been no health concerns for the baby to this point. “Why do you ask Kim?”

“Well, Shego here is the other parent through some sort of crazy genetic manipulation by Drakken and DNAmy. Shego has plasma powers which have affected her on a genetic level, so I was just wondering if that could cause my baby to have any sorts of…defects?” Kim said it like it was no big deal, even though dread was filling her with each word.

It however was quite a stunning revelation to Dr. Davis, who had been unaware of exactly who the father was. “Uh…uh…I honestly have no idea. I guess if DNAmy mixed the genetic material then she could have made it so that the child won’t have any health issues or it could be the flip side and have plenty. We can do an amniocentesis test later on, to see what is going on, but at this stage in the game there would be no way to know.”

“Okay.” Kim’s voice was quiet and worried. Shego frowned in consternation; she did not like to see Pumpkin looking like this and it was upsetting her as well. Maybe she needed to pay a visit to DNAmy and see what she could get on this particular genetic combination. If she knew Amy at all, she knew that the woman would at least keep her notes of the procedure, which would include such things. Overall as villains went Amy was actually pretty nice and moderately easy to talk to, despite her obsession with CuddleBuddies. Shego had a few special series Cuddlebuddies stashed away that she could use as payment, so that should make things easier.

Shego reached out and laid a hand on Kimmie’s shoulder, to comfort the red head. “Don’t worry Princess. I’ll talk to Amy and find out what’s up with things, okay? It’s no big.”

Kim’s look said all that it had to about how thankful the girl was. If DNAmy didn’t want to talk Shego would beat the answers out of her.

“So Doc, is there anything else my wife needs to know right now?” replied Shego, actually wanting to start the hunt.

Dr. Davis was a bit thrown by how blunt the father…uhm…mother was but managed to retain her composure. It’s not like she was being threatened or anything. “Not really. Just keep taking care of her and making sure she takes her neonatal vitamins and exercises. I’ll see the both of you in two weeks?”

Kim nodded as the doctor left the room, lost in her own thoughts. Shego pulled Kim into her arms once the door closed, knowing that Kim needed the support right then, and honestly so did she. Kim shook a little in her arms, obviously scared at the possible genetic monstrosity that was growing inside of her. Anne rested her hand on Kim’s shoulder as well. It all helped. Kim looked up with fearful eyes and asked, “Shego…do…do you think our baby is okay?”

“Kim, DNAmy is many things but that big of a monster…not likely. I figure our baby is in perfect health to the best of Amy’s ability. She would never hurt a child like that. I mean look at how she treats her own monsters, like they were her own children. I can hunt her down and ask her if you want, just to be on the safe side.” said Shego, trying to comfort her wife, hugging the narrow shoulders tightly.

“Can…can I come with you?” Kim was worried that Shego would leave her behind, because it might be dangerous.

“If you want. But we’re jut going to talk to her, not arrest her, okay?” Shego wanted to make sure that was clear. Amy really wasn’t like Drakken who had screwed her over a number of times and so deserved that kind of courtesy.

“Okay.” Kim didn’t even fight that.

“I will see if I can find her, or maybe nerdlinger can help and we can do this tonight or tomorrow? Will that be okay?” Shego’s voice was soft and soothing and Anne was a bit surprised. From everything she knew of the thief, this was the last tone that should have ever been heard. Kim nodded, accepting it easily. Shego gave her another hug and then stood slowly, not letting go of her red head. “Okay. Come on love, let’s go home.”