"Mama Matriarch"

---

His stomach dropped. The name flashing on the caller ID filled him with so much dread that he suddenly felt far too constricted in his body. How could he have forgotten? How could he have forgotten?!

"Drewbie!?"

He realized he was holding the phone to his ear and hadn't said one word. "I, er, uh.." He stuttered before slamming the phone back down on the receiver.

"Who was that?" Shego questioned, sauntering towards him in her bathing suit with a towel wrapped around her shoulders.

Drakken looked up at her, his eyes large and worried. "My mother."

It took her a moment but the same look of terror washed across her face. "Oh no... you didn't... you didn't forget, did you?"

He nodded meekly and she bit her lip.

The phone rang again and both turned their attention towards the object which now seemed to be emitting pure evil.

"You better get that," she warned, now sighing with defeat.

His hand hesitated over the telephone before reaching out and slowly raising it to his ear. "H-hello? Mother?"

Shego could hear her screaming from where she stood.

"Why are you hanging up on your mother?! YOUR MOTHER!" She repeated, causing Drakken to shrink back from the phone.

"I just... I just thought it was a tele-marketer. Yes, that's it, a tele-marketer!" His face lit up with the glee that only a good excuse could bring. He smiled towards Shego causing her to roll her eyes impatiently and pull the towel a little tighter around her neck.

After a moment she deduced that his reasoning had worked because she could no longer hear his mother from where she stood. She took a few steps forward, dripping water from her jacuzzi, and leaned in closer to the doctor.

He waved her away and spun around in his chair to face the table as he spoke. "Yes- I- yes mother, I know it's been awhile but-"

She noticed he was fighting to get a word in edgewise to whatever Mama Lipsky was saying. She gave him a curious look, eager to know what they were talking about, but he waved her away once again.

"Now? No I- no I don't have plans but I don't see how- yes-" he let out a frustrated sigh and rubbed his temples, "I can't just drop everything and rush over- Hey! You let me talk!- Ok, ok I'm sorry- I- yes, right away- all right, I- fine- see you soon." He made sure she had hung up before slamming the phone down and hitting his head on the table.

"What?" Shego practically whined, bouncing on the balls of her feet.

He didn't lift his head from the desk when he spoke to her. "Go get dressed, we're paying mother a visit."

---

Shego had spent months sleeping on a cot in prison, been completely submerged in a building made entirely of cheese, and had the snot kicked out of her too many times to count by a teenaged heroine, but nothing, nothing was as uncomfortable as this fresh new torture she was only just being introduced to.

She couldn't help but notice how horribly her green cat-suit clashed with the frilly pink furniture that adorned Mama Lipsky's small house.

"You saved the what?!" Drakken's mother practically screamed from the kitchen, almost dropping the tray of cookies she was carrying.

"...The world." He said it as if the word was a curse and averted his eyes from hers.

"Oh my little Drewbie!" She exclaimed, rushing to his side and pinching his cheeks in what she considered an affectionate manner. "I always knew he had it in him!" she said, turning her attention towards Shego.

"Yep, our little Drewbie is a hero!" She declared with a dry smirk.

Only Drakken picked up on her sarcasm and growled furiously. "Zip the lip, Shego."

"Oh, this is so fabulous! I wonder what the girls on the bingo bus will say when I tell them that my son is a hero!" Mama Lipsky continued on, oblivious to Drakken's frustration.

He sighed quietly. "That's really not necessary, Mother."

"Of course it is! Don't say that!" She reprimanded, swatting at his arm. "Let your mother be proud! Now," she started, smoothing out her son's lab coat from where she had previously hit him, "We just need to find you a nice girl and you'll be all set!"

Both Shego and Drakken's eyes went wide and turned toward the other. Oh no.

"Eh heh, funny thing actually," Rubbing his neck nervously, Drakken started to explain.

Shego ran a hand down her face and groaned.

He pursed his lips, went to speak, then pursed his lips again at a loss for words. "Well mother, me and Shego-" he corrected himself, "Shego and I, we uhm, well..." He had no idea how to say it. Whether that stemmed from his usual lack of eloquence or the inability to actually form the words I am in a relationship with Shego didn't matter, Mama Lipsky picked up on it right away.

In that moment Shego had the pleasure of experiencing her first ever hug from Drakken's mother.

It was just as excruciating as she'd imagined.

"You and my Drewbie?! You and my baby boy are dating?!" She was practically buzzing as she dropped Shego down on the couch and ran back towards the kitchen.

Shego massaged her sore ribs gently and shot Drakken a look so vehement in its disdain that he began twiddling his thumbs and whistling innocently towards the ceiling. Mama Lipsky came rushing back in with the tray of cookies she had prepared and began forcing them towards Shego.

"Eat up, eat up! Look at you," she said, pinching Shego's arm while simultaneously shoving a cookie down her throat, "You're far too skinny! You need to put some meat on those bones if you're going to be carrying a baby!"

Shego could not suppress her chortle, causing her to cough and choke up cookie crumbs. After catching her breath she managed to sarcastically spit out, "Yeah right! Me and Drakken with kids? You wish!"

She was met only with silence and looking around to the shocked face of Drakken and the uncharacteristically stony face of Mama Lipsky she realized she had said the wrong thing.

Really wrong.

"Did you know that everyone else on my bingo bus has grandkids? Did you know that?" Mama Lipsky asked quietly, her words slow and stilted in an eerily threatening manner. "Did you know I have to sit there and look at picture after picture of birthday parties and new haircuts? Did you know that I have to say 'Oh once my Drew finds a nice girl I'll have plenty of grandkids' over and over again?!"

Shego looked around wildly at Drakken for some sort of support but he merely shrugged and grimaced, clearly staying out of this one.

"So listen here missy," She took a step closer, "I'm going to have grandkids whether you're involved or not. So why don't you just run along and find some other young man to corrupt or settle down and fill yourself up with a grandkid for me to knit sweaters for and spoil during the holidays, mmkay?" She added a positively venomous smile at the end, so sickeningly sweet that it frightened Drakken to the core.

Shego jumped up now completely offended. "Woah there, time out. It's my body and I'll 'fill it up' with whatever I want and that sure as hell isn't going to be some Lipsky brat! So why don't you just lay off and... and bake a pie or something!" She was practically seething. If she thinks she can just- and the nerve- who does she think she is? Well, she's got another thing coming if she thinks-

Drakken let loose an audible gasp and stood up quickly. "Shego, it's probably time for us to go... I think I left the stove on! Yes! And the microwave as well! We really ought to be-"

"Shut up!" Shego barked, never taking her eyes from his mother.

"Don't you dare talk to my son that way you... you hussy!"

"Oh, oh I'm the hussy now? Drakken's only forty-two and exactly how old did you say you were? Hmm?" Shego goaded with obvious arrogance.

Drakken fled the house just as Mama Lipsky's face contorted with a newfound rage.

---

"I don't wanna talk about it!" Shego shouted as she stomped out of the house several minutes later.

"Believe me," he replied, "I was not going to ask." Drakken waited for her to get situated before taking off in the hover-car.

Her lips stayed pursed for several long moments before she noticed that there were still crumbs in her hair from when, in the ensuing frenzy, the pink haired woman had used cookies as a weapon. She struggled furiously trying to brush them out but gave up shortly after and instead sat and brooded. "Oh," she said, breaking the silence that had built on the ride home, "thanks for the help back there." She added a quiet snarl for extra measure.

He only looked at her and shrugged. "You know mother." And that was all that was needed to be said.

There was a long pause before she spoke again. "I'm not going to any family reunions, you know."

He kept his eyes straight ahead but a small smile flickered across his face before it was lost in a deep sigh. "I wouldn't expect any less."

---

Concerning the title:

Anyone, please, if you can come up with a better title (I only request it uses alliteration like my other stories) then I would gladly use it. This title is driving me nuts.