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Shepard glanced at the tiny, little clock on the holographic screen of her computer. It read 2:13. She had known it was getting awfully late, but she had no idea it was that late yet. That explained why she felt so damn hungry. She hadn’t gone down to the mess hall when James had told her over the intercom that dinner was ready. She had said that she would get down there later. That she had too much work to do. That had been seven hours ago, and she still hadn’t eaten.
She sighed, stood up, and stretched. She had to eat something. The last thing she needed was to be berated by everyone for not eating. Well, that wasn’t really the last thing she needed. No, that would be reapers killing everyone. Everyone being mad at her over something so small still wasn’t good.
She leaned against one of the side walls of the elevator as she waited for it to bring her down to the crew’s quarters. She hoped no one was up, and relaxing in the mess hall. They need their rest as much as she did, and the few people who should be needed to be working.
Initially, she was glad to hear the lack of chatter, but it meant that she could hear someone at work in the kitchen. Her bets were on one of the boys. All four of the guys on the ground team had a tendency to be in the kitchen late at night. For Javik, it meant he was less likely to be bothered. For Garrus it meant there was less likely to be an issue of cross-contamination when he made food for himself and Tali. Meanwhile, both James and Kaidan tended to just eat a lot .
She rounded the elevator, and was both glad and a little disappointed to see that out of everyone, it was Kaidan. On the one hand, they rarely ever got any real alone time. On the other hand, the poor man probably got stuck up late doing reports, and she was more hungry than anything.
Despite being as hungry as she was, when she realized that Kaidan wasn’t aware that she was there yet, she hung back a bit to watch him work. He wasn’t wearing anything special, just his fatigues, and yet, he looked as good as ever. He worked his body just as hard as he worked his biotics, and it paid off.
Just as she was about to let him know she was there, a wicked idea popped into her head when she spotted the bunch of grapes that someone had left out from the last time they’d visited the Citadel. Biotics weren’t exactly known for their… precision, but she knew what she was doing. A small biotic field appeared around one of the grapes, and gently lifted it off of its stem. She slowly raised the grape into the air before flinging as fast as was safe at Kaidan’s head. Just as the grape was about to make contact, he moved out of the way, and it smacked into the backsplash like a small, rubber ball.
“Did you really think that would work, Alice?” Kaidan chuckled, looking over his shoulder at her.
“Not really, but it was worth a shot,” she replied, and started making her way over to where he was in the kitchen, “What are you making?”
“Uhm, I think it’s supposed to be spaghetti, though, it doesn’t really count. You know how rations are.”
“At least it’s not the worst kind out there,” she said as she wrapped her arm around his waist.
“That’s true.”
They stood like that as she watched him continue to cook, but then she felt something small, and slightly squishy hit the back of her head. She slowly turned her head to look at him, “Did you just hit me with a grape?”
“Can’t take what you dish out?” he grinned.
“Oh, you know I can take it. I just wanted to make sure that you know what you’re getting yourself into.”
“With you, Alice? I might not know the details, but I always have an idea of what I’m getting into with you. Besides, I need to waste some time while I wait for the…” he grimaced at the pot on the stove where the food was heating up, “rations to warm up- Hey!”
As he glanced away she managed to grab another grape and maneuver it around to the behind him. It smacked him right in the center of the back of his head as he was talking. She gave him a wicked grin before diving behind the otherside of the kitchen island. About three grapes went whizzing over her head before she hit the floor. She used her own biotics to launch them right back across the room. The air between where Alice and Kaidan was tinted green, blue, and purple from the biotic energy and the grapes flying through the air. She winced when one the grapes landed on the floor in a particularly messy way. She really wasn’t looking forward to scraping bits of grapes up off of the floor. She wasn’t going to make any of the crew clean up after her after all.
They continued to fail to hit each other with the grapes for a few more seconds before Alice popped her head up over the edge of the counter and spottered the various other fruit that had been sitting next to the grapes. She immediately skipped over the apples, this was a joke fight, but then her eyes landed on the clementines. Sadly, Kaidan seemed to get the same idea as her when he looked up to see why she had paused.
A field of blue energy surrounded one of the small fruits, and while it was easily lifted into the air, it seemed to get stuck about a foot off of the counter. It vibrated violently, and it became a battle of their wills. She looked at Kaidan briefly. His expression was a combination of concentration and that damn smirk of his. Normally, she loved that expression, it looked good on his face, but now it only spurred her desire to win on.
Just as she raised one of her hands, Garrus’s dual-toned voice rang out through the level, “What are you two doing?”
Both Alice and Kaidan lost concentration, and the clementine fell onto the counter. It bounced once, and proceeded to roll onto the floor. Had it been an apple, it would have been beyond bruised.
Alice shot to her feet, and leaned against the counter nonchalantly, “Just flexing our biotics.”
“By making a mess, and abusing the fruit?”
As he said that the alarm for Kaidan’s food went off. He shuffled over to the stove, careful to not step on any of the grapes surrounding him. He chuckled as he turned off the alarm, “People can still eat the grapes, er, well, most of them anyway. Besides, have you never heard of a food fight?”
“Turians are a lot less fond of wasting food. Any kind of food fight would probably involve poison.”
“I… can’t tell if you’re lying or not,” Kaidan said.
“I think he’s just saying what he thinks. There is no way in hell that there has never been a turian food fight.”
“Well, I’ve never been part of one. Eating food is a far better use of it. Speaking of which, you aren’t cooking that just to throw it at each other, are you?”
“No, this is for eating purposes only,” Alice chuckled.
“Well, let’s hope we’re not boarded by reapers then,” Garrus said.