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The safehouse was supposed to be empty. That had been the entire point.
Three days ago, in a quiet corner of the Normandy's docking bay, Shepard had passed her a temporary access code. "One time use." Shepard had warned. "Officially, this conversation never happened." She added and Miranda had almost smiled.
Almost.
The code was legitimate, the location secure. Most importantly, it was somewhere Cerberus wouldn't think to look. It was exactly what she needed. Now standing outside the apartment door she keyed in the final sequence. The holographic lock clicked as it disengaged. Miranda cautiously stepped inside. The door sealed behind her, and a cool darkness greeted her.
Good.
For the first time in days a fraction of the tension in her shoulders eased. The apartment showed no signs of any active alarms, no signs of forced entry, no indications anyone had followed her.
It was a modest apartment by Citadel standards, but it was exceptionally secure. That was to be expected a Spectre safehouses wasn't designed for comfort. They were designed to disappear, designed to be a was a place to hide, a place to work, a place to breathe, and Miranda intended to do all four.
Walking deeper into the apartment she noticed a coffee mug and her relief vanished instantly. It sat unassuming beside the sink, fresh. It didn't look abandoned or left behind it had to have been used recently.
Her eyes swept across the room catching things she foolishly didn't notice before. There was an active datapad on the counter and a chair slightly angled away from the kitchen table.
Someone was here.
Miranda's hand slipped beneath her jacket, her pistol cleared its holster in one smooth motion. Holding it in front of her readied she paused a moment, listening. The apartment was silent.
She advanced forward carefully, every sense sharpened as she mentally prepared her biotics to simmer just under the surface.
Living room: clear
Kitchen partially visible: no movement
One bedroom door open : empty
Whoever was here weren't making themself obvious. Taking another step forward Miranda’s hand tightened on her pistol.
"Most people knock."
The voice came from the kitchen. Miranda whipped around, her pistol came up instantly. In the low light a familiar figure stepped forward. Alliance blues, broad shoulders, dark hair.
Kaidan Alenko.
For a moment neither moved. Recognition settled between them immediately. Not familiarity, not friendliness, recognition. The kind forged through brief encounters, information dossiers, shared battlefields, and mutual distrust.
Kaidan's gaze dropped to the pistol pointed at him. One eyebrow lifted. "Good evening."
Miranda lowered the weapon slightly.
"Major."
"Lawson." His expression remained calm, but she could see the tension underneath. "I didn't realize Cerberus had access to Spectre property."
The accusation landed exactly where he'd intended. her jaw tightened in response. "I didn't realize Alliance officers were squatting in Spectre safehouses."
A faint flicker of amusement crossed his face. "I'm not."
The answer irritated her more than it should have. Of course he had a legitimate reason to be here. Of course Shepard's supposedly empty safehouse had a current occupant. Because apparently the universe wasn't finished testing her patience.
Kaidan folded his arms. "What are you doing here?"
Miranda considered several responses. Most involved telling him it wasn't his business, all of them were technically true. "Temporary accommodation."
His eyes narrowed slightly. "That's vague."
"It wasn't intended as a conversation starter."
For a second neither spoke and an uncomfortable silence stretched as neither willing to yield ground. Until Kaidan broke it first with a deep sigh. "Shepard gave you the code?"
Miranda hesitated before responding "Yes."
Something shifted in his expression. Not trust, certainly not trust. If anything consideration. It seemed ad if he was weighing something. Eventually he nodded once, a small gesture as if it was only for himself.
"You haven't reported me." The words left her before she could stop them.
Kaidan looked mildly surprised by the observation. "Thought about it."
Miranda blinked, but he shrugged one shoulder. "I know who you are, Horizon wasn't exactly forgettable."
Her eyes flickered. The colony, the Collectors, the argument. Shepard caught between two worlds. Nobody had left that encounter happy.
"I also remember Shepard trusting you, even if only a little." His gaze settled on her steady and direct. "That's not the same thing as me trusting you."
There it was the truth, clean and uncomplicated. Miranda found herself respecting the directness. There was no polite political maneuvering, no false friendliness, just honesty. Kaidan had never struck her as the type to hide where he stood.
"You don't approve."
A humorless laugh escaped him. "Cerberus attacked Alliance colonies." One finger unfolded from his crossed arms. "Experimented on civilians." Another. "Murdered service members." A third. "Is currently hindering any progress we make in this war." His gaze met hers again. "No. I don't approve."
Miranda held his stare. To her surprise, he didn't continue. He didn't demand an explanation from her. Didn't lump her together with everything Cerberus had become and what it was. The distinction wasn't forgiveness, but it was there and she noticed it.
Eventually Kaidan nodded behind him toward the kitchen. "You can put the gun away."
Miranda looked at him for a long moment, then holstered the weapon. Not because she trusted him because if he'd intended to arrest her or start a fight, he would have already tried.
Kaidan seemed to notice her hesitation. However before either could say anything the scent of coffee reached her. It was fresh, real, and not the synthetic sludge served on starships and stations. Kaidan caught the direction of her glance as she looked for the source. A corner of his mouth twitched, the closest thing to a smile she'd ever seen from him. "I made coffee."
Miranda opened her mouth a prepared refusal already forming, but she realized she couldn't remember the last time she'd had real coffee. "One cup."
The corner of his mouth twitched again and he turned his back on her to go back into the kitchen.
The coffee was good, annoyingly good.
Miranda sat at the small kitchen table, warming her hands against the mug while she studied the apartments layout. Like most safe houses shed been to or arranged, the layout prioritized function over comfort. The main living area connected directly to a compact kitchen. Four doors branched off a narrow hallway beyond. Three bedrooms well not quite. The furthest door stood partially open allowing a glimpse inside. It wasnt a bedroom at all, it was an armory support room. From what she could tell there was a maintenance bench lined one wall with tools hung neatly above it. A handful of spare thermal clips occupied several storage shelves alongside repair kits, medi-gel, replacement armor seals, and enough emergency supplies to keep an operative functional for several days. It was practical, efficient, and very predictable.
Across from her, Kaidan leaned against the counter nursing his own coffee. Neither had spoken for several minutes. The silence wasn't comfortable, but it wasn't hostile either.
Finally Kaidan nodded toward the hallway. "Two bedrooms are empty."
Miranda glanced up. "I'm capable of finding one."
"I figured." A faint trace of amusement touched his voice. "It was more of a courtesy."
Miranda took another sip and the coffee remained irritatingly excellent. "You always this hospitable to unexpected guests?"
"No."
The answer came immediately and again honest. Something about Kaidan's straightforwardness kept throwing her off balance. Most people danced around uncomfortable truths. He seemed determined to walk directly through them.
"Most unexpected guests aren't former Cerberus officers carrying Spectre authorization."
"Former?"
"Shepard would have never given you those codes if you still were."
The words settled between them, Miranda looked down into her cup and the silence returned to the apartment.
Outside the apartment, the distant hum of Citadel traffic echoed faintly through the walls. The station never truly slept, not even now. Not while the war consumed the galaxy. Not while millions waited for news that rarely improved.
Miranda stared toward the darkened window. She should leave.
Leave.
Find another location.
Keep moving.
Keep working.
Keep searching.
It was what she'd been doing for weeks, months even. Even considering it left her feeling exhausted. It was an exhuation that wasn't even physically. It was starting to form into something deeper, something harder to ignore. As though every reserve she'd built for herself was finally beginning to run dry.
Kaidan's voice interrupted the thought. "It's late."
She glanced back toward him. "And?"
"And whatever you're doing, you shouldn't be doing it tonight."
Miranda's eyes narrowed. "You don't know what I'm doing."
He shrugged. "No."
"But I know what someone running on fumes looks like."
His observation landed uncomfortably close to the truth.
Miranda set her cup down. "Your concern is unnecessary."
Kaidan pushed away from the counter. "I'm not concerned, and I've got work to do in the morning."
Miranda suspected that was only a fraction of the truth. New specters didn't spend their time sitting in safe houses drinking coffee. She understood that much, but had no interest in asking.
He paused near the hallway. "Just so you know-"
Miranda looked up and Kaidan rubbed the back of his neck searching for the right words. "I'm not going to ask questions."
Her eyes narrowed slightly. "Why?"
A shadow crossed his expression it was gone almost as quickly as it appeared. "Because if Shepard trusted you enough to hand over a Spectre access code..." He shrugged. "I'm trying to trust that she had a reason."
The answer struck harder than Miranda expected. Not because of what he said. Because of how difficult it seemed for him to say it. Trust seemed to be something he didn't offered lightly. Especially not to someone wearing her history, especially not now. When she finally spoke, her voice was quieter then she wanted. "Thank you." The words surprised both of them.
Kaidan blinked once. Then nodded, simple, uncomplicated. "Try to get some sleep."
Miranda almost laughed. Sleep. As if it were that easy, like she could simply close her eyes and silence everything waiting for her outside those walls. From her spot at the table she could hear a door opened and close. For several minutes she simply sat with the cup of coffee cooling in her hands. Just listening, waiting. Expecting something to go wrong, an alarm, an attack, a message, anything. Nothing came. Only silence, only 'safety'.
Eventually Miranda reluctently rose from her chair and headed toward the empty bedroom. Just for one night maybe she could find the time for herself.
The room was small it had a narrow bed, a desk bolted to one wall, a deactivated terminal, and nothing else. It was exactly the sort of room designed for temporary occupancy, she preferred it that way. She closed the door behind her and stood motionless for several seconds.
She just stood there staring at nothing. There was still things she could do, messages waiting to be decrypted, leads to research But was nothing that couldn't wait a few hours or a night. Having this time it should have felt like relief. Instead it felt strange...wrong. Over the last almost year her body had become so accustomed to the constant motion that this stillness felt unfamiliar.
Miranda sat carefully on the edge of the bed. Pain immediately flared along her side. She ignored it, like she'd ignored it for the last three days.The injury wasn't life threatening. It was just inconvenient and could wait. She reached for the zipper of her jacket, paused and let out a shaky slow exhale. The room tilted. Only slightly, but it was just enough to notice. She closed her eye. It was fatigue, nothing more. This was something a few hours of sleep could solve. She had certainly functioned under worse conditions. The thought sounded considerably more convincing in her head than it actually felt.
She rolled her neck and thought that maybe a nice hot shower would be nice before she tried to get some rest. She pushed herself up off the bed. The movement proved to be a mistake. The pain lanced through her side and the room shifted sharply. Her vision blurred, for one humiliating second her knees threatened to give out entirely. Miranda caught herself against the desk. Her breathing hard as her vision swam.
Wonderful!
Leaning over the desk still she shut her eyes tight. She tried to get her breathing under control. It took some times but once she was calmer she straightened. Taking another moments pause to wait for the sensation to pass. Once the feeling mostly dissipated she opened her eyes. She needed medi-gel. Unfountently it seemed like her injury decided it no longer was allowing her to ignore it. The safehouse armory had supplies. This would just a quick trip down the hallway. A few minutes tops. Problem solved. Then she could get that warm shower that was sounding more and more amazing the more she thought about it.
Miranda opened the door. The hallway remained dark and quiet. Good. She stepped out into the hall made it only a few careful steps before the pain surged. She stumbled at the unexpectedly strong surge of pain. The world tilted, a hand caught her elbow before she hit the wall. She froze.
Damn it.
"Easy."
It was Kaidan's voice, of course it was.
For one brief second she considered pretending nothing had happened. Just quickly return to the room she was staying in and swallow the pain all night. Then she remembered he had just physically stopped her from falling over and that particular strategy was no longer available.
Kaidan's grip loosened immediately. His hand wasn't trapping her, nor did he hold on longer than necessary. Just enough to make sure she was steady.
"You okay?"
The question was simple. Miranda would have preferred an accusation. Those were easier to deal with.
"I'm fine."
The answer came out automatically. Kaidan looked unconvinced.
"Right."
Miranda pulled her arm free the motion was sharper than intended.
"I lost my footing."
"Uh-huh."
His tone remained infuriatingly neutral.
The hallway lights had activated during the commotion. Bright enough now for her to see him properly. He looked as though he'd only recently left his room. Sleeves rolled up, hair slightly disheveled, and a datapad tucked beneath one arm. Not asleep after all. Miranda wasn't sure why that made her feel better.
Kaidan's gaze drifted downward, just for a second. Then back up. His expression had changed, It was subtly. Miranda's stomach sank. He'd seen it. The faint stain that had spread through the side of her jacket from when she was shot a few days ago.
"Damn it." She muttered.
His eyes narrowed. "You're hurt."
"It's nothing." Another lie, another immediate failure. Because Kaidan simply looked at her patiently. The way one might wait for a particularly stubborn recruit to stop embarrassing themselves. Miranda folded her arms an immediately regretted decision. The movement had pulled painfully at her side.
Kaidan noticed. Of course he had noticed.
"How long?"
Miranda stared at him. "I'm fine."
"How long?"
"I said I'm fine."
His expression remained calm, steady, infuriating. Miranda glared at him. He didn't budge. For several seconds they stood there in silence. Both exhausted, both stubborn. It was this moment her body chose that moment to betray her again. The hallway shifted as her vision began to swim. Kaidan saw it and concern crossed his face before he could hide it. That somehow that made everything worse. Miranda could tolerate suspicion, she could tolerate distrust, but concern was far more dangerous, because concern implied weakness, and weakness was something she'd spent her entire life ensuring nobody ever saw.
"Miranda." The use of her name finally made her look up. His voice had softened. "You almost hit the floor."
Silence.
"Let me help." The words landed like a challenge. Every instinct she possessed immediately rejected them. She didn't need help. Didn't want help. She had survived far worse without help. But standing there in the middle of a dim hallway, fighting dizziness she could no longer entirely hide, Miranda found herself confronting an irritating reality. Kaidan had already seen. The damage was done. The only question left was how much dignity she could salvage from it.
Miranda exhaled slowly. "I am going to the armory."
Kaidan glanced toward the end of the hallway. "Good." His answer immediately annoyed her.
Before she could say anything else he was already moving. Not toward her past her. Heading down the hallway toward the supply room.
Miranda stared after him. "What are you doing?"
"Helping."
"I didn't agree to that."
Kaidan looked back over one shoulder. "Noted."
Then continued walking. The sheer audacity of it was almost impressive. Miranda pushed away from the wall and followed. Only because she needed the medi-gel.
The walk to the armory was only a few meters, but it felt considerably longer. The dizziness hadn't completely faded either. The worst of it was she hated that he knew, hated that he'd seen it, hated the quiet concern she kept catching in his expression. By the time they reached the last door, Miranda was already irritated with both him and herself. The armory support room was larger than it had appeared from the hallway. Storage shelves lined one wall, tools occupied another, a worn couch sat beneath a bank of secured lockers, apparently intended for operatives working long hours on repairs. Kaidan switched on the lights. Miranda carefully lowered herself onto the couch, or at least as carefully as she could manage.
She reached for her jacket to take it off. The zipper caught, she let out a sharp wince escaped before she could stop it. Kaidan was already opening a medical kit he'd pulled from one of the shelves.
"I'm capable of handling this myself."
"Mm-hm." Kaidan carried the kit over and sat beside her, close enough to work. She immediately reached for the medkit, his hand effortlessly intercepted hers.
"Major."
"I've got field medic training."
The kit snapped open across his lap. Disinfectant, bandages, medi-gel, all the basic human trauma supplies. His hands moved across everything with a practiced familiarity.
"I can manage."
"I don't doubt that." He removed a small sealed antibacterial tube. "Humor me."
Miranda rolled her eyes.
Yes, well, I rebuilt an entire woman.
Technically.
With a team of specialists, unlimited resources, and years of Cerberus funding.
Still. The comparison made her feel slightly better. Unfortunately it did nothing to solve the current problem. Kaidan waited, patient, and unmovable. Eventually Miranda surrendered with all the grace of someone losing an argument she knew she couldn't win. Which was to say none at all. She fully unzipped the jacket letting it fall behind her back. Then carefully lifted the edge of her shirt. Kaidan's expression sharpened immediately. There was a long graze stretched across her side. The wound wasn't anywhere deep enough to be fatal. Just dangerous enough to become a problem if ignored. Which, admittedly, she had done.
The edge of the projectile had torn through armor and flesh before continuing on its way. It was a lucky shot, or an unlucky one, depending on perspective.
Kaidan sighed. "You call this nothing?"
"It missed anything important."
"It also looks infected."
Miranda frowned.
"It is not infected."
"It is."
Before she could formulate a response, he touched the wound. Pain shot through her side. Miranda sucked in a sharp breath. Her hand tightened against the couch cushion. Kaidan thankfully was smart enough not to comment. Instead, he reached into the medical kit and produced a foil wrapped ration bar.
"Eat."
Miranda looked at it.
"Why?"
"Because you nearly fell over in the hallway."
"That was unrelated."
Kaidan gave her a look. Miranda rolled her eyes accepting the bar, unwrapping it and taking a bite.
The silence that followed stretching between them for several moments. Only interrupted by the quiet sounds of medical supplies being opened.Eventually Miranda spoke, mostly because the alternative was focusing on the pain.
"How did you know my name?"
Kaidan glanced up briefly.
"Shepard."
She blinked.
"What?"
"I heard Shepard call you Miranda." Carefully he kept cleaning the wound. "It was after that Praetorian."
Miranda searched her memory. Horizon, smoke, sollectors, chaos, and a giant floating nightmare trying very hard to kill all of them. Not exactly ideal conditions for introductions.
"You remember that?"
Kaidan huffed a quiet laugh.
"Hard to forget."
His attention remained on the wound.
"I'd just gotten released from some paralysis field." The memory darkened his expression slightly. "By the time I made it to the defense tower, Garrus was lining up the kill shot." A faint smile appeared briefly, gone almost immediately. "Then I saw Shepard." His hands paused, only for a second. "And you."
The room fell quiet. Neither needed to discuss what had happened after that. Kaidan simply resumed working and Miranda found herself oddly grateful when he didn't continue.
He reached for a fresh applicator. "You always this stubborn?"
Miranda blinked, the abrupt shift caught her off guard. "What?"
"You've been bleeding through your jacket for at least a day."
His tone remained perfectly serious.
"Possibly two."
Miranda looked away.
"That's not an answer."
"No."
A faint smile touched his mouth.
"It really isn't."
Miranda rolled her eyes and after another several seconds she found herself watching his hands. They where steady and precise. He wasn't rushing. Which became increasingly irritating.
"You're taking too long."
Kaidan didn't even look up. "No, I'm not."
"You are."
"I'm really not."
Miranda crossed her arms. Then remembered why that was a terrible idea and uncrossed them again.
The corner of Kaidan's mouth twitched.
"Don't start."
"I'm serious."
"So am I."
He continued applying the antibacterial cream. The sting had dulled to a persistent ache.
"We're in a safehouse." Kaidan continued. "Last time I checked, nobody was shooting at us."
Miranda frowned. "I'm aware."
"Good."
He reached for the medigel pack. "Because that's the difference."
She looked at him. "What difference?"
Kaidan finally glanced up. The look he gave her suggested he couldn't believe he was having this conversation. "The difference between proper treatment and slapping medigel on it, throwing painkillers at you, and calling it good."
Miranda opened her mouth, closed it again, because admittedly that was exactly what she would have done.
Kaidan immediately recognized the expression. "Thought so."
Miranda resisted the urge to throw something at him, the resistant only came from the fact she was fairly certain he would dodge it.
"You're enjoying this."
His eyebrows rose. "Treating a stubborn patient? Not particularly."
She chuckled despite herself. The sound surprised both of them. Kaidan looked up. Miranda immediately wished she hadn't. Something about the small smile that appeared on his face made her strangely self conscious.
"You laugh."
"Occasionally."
"Huh."
She narrowed her eyes. "What does that mean?"
"Nothing."
"It absolutely means something."
Kaidan laughed. A quiet sound, warm, unexpected. "Okay." He adjusted the bandage. "You just seem like the kind of person who schedules laughter."
Miranda stared at him. For a moment she genuinely couldn't tell whether he was joking. "You think I schedule laughter."
"A little."
"A little."
His smile widened. "A color coded calendar, maybe."
The ridiculousness of it caught her completely off guard. Against all logic, she laughed again. A real one this time, short, brief, but real.
Kaidan looked entirely too satisfied about it.
"I hate that expression."
"What expression?"
"The one you're making."
"I'm patching up your injury."
"You're being smug."
"Can both things be true?"
Miranda began to realize she was no longer waiting for the conversation to end, no longer waiting for him to be done as quickly as possible. An odd thought. She couldn't remember the last time she'd simply sat with someone without needing something from them.
Kaidan secured a final bandage. "There."
Miranda looked down. The dressing was significantly more thorough than anything she would have done herself. "You done?"
"Almost."
She groaned and Kaidan laughed.
"You're impossible."
"I've been called worse."
"I'm sure."
He reached for a small injector.
Painkillers.
Miranda immediately frowned.
"No."
Kaidan sighed there was no frustration in it.
"Miranda."
"No."
"They're painkillers."
"I'm aware."
"They'll help."
"I'll survive."
A long pause.
Then:
"See, that's exactly the problem."
Miranda blinked.
"What?"
Kaidan set the injector aside.
Not giving up.
Simply changing tactics.
"You keep acting like surviving and being okay are the same thing."
The words landed harder than they should have. Miranda looked anywhere except at him. The room felt different. There was no pressure behind him helping her. There was sense that she was being studied for weakness, or measured for usefulness, or guided toward an answer she hadn’t agreed to give. Kaidan wasn’t taking anything from her not information, leverage, control. Just time, left untouched.
Eventually Kaidan cleared his throat. "Besides." His voice had regained some of its earlier humor. "If you pass out, I'll have to carrying you back to your room."
Miranda immediately looked back to him. "That's not happening."
"Good." He snapped the medkit closed. "Then take the painkillers."
Miranda stared at him. The annoying thing was that he genuinely expected her to listen. Not because he was ordering her to, not because he thought she couldn't make her own decisions, because somewhere during the last hour he'd apparently decided her well being was his problem. It should have irritated her. Instead it just made her tired, not physically, emotionally. The kind of tired that settled deep in a person's bones. The kind that came from carrying everything alone for far too long.
Kaidan was still looking at her, waiting. As though he had all the time in the world.
Miranda wasn't entirely sure what possessed her. Maybe it was the exhaustion. Maybe it was the thought of the painkillers sitting untouched between them. Maybe it was the fact that he hadn't once treated her like she was broken, hadn't judged her, hadn't pushed. Had simply sat beside her and helped because she needed it.
Whatever the reason she leaned forward. Kaidan blinked clearly confused. And before either of them could think too hard about it, Miranda kissed him. For one stunned second he froze. The expression on his face would have been amusing under different circumstances. It was pure surprise, the kind she imagined very few people ever managed to get past his defenses. Then Kaidan kissed her back It was gentle and tentative. As though giving her every opportunity to change her mind. The thought almost made her laugh, because changing her mind would have required understanding why she'd done it in the first place.
After a moment she pulled back, not far just enough to look him in the eyes. Neither of them spoke. Neither seemed entirely certain what to say. Miranda certainly wasn't. For once in her life, she had acted first and analyzed later. A deeply questionable strategy. Kaidan looked every bit as surprised as she felt. Which, admittedly, helped. A lot.
For several seconds they simply stared at one another. Everything felt strangely normal despite the fact that absolutely nothing about the situation was normal. She should have said something. Something sharp, something controlled, something that put distance back between them.
She didn’t.
And before she could talk herself out of it, before either of them could overthink it. She leaned forward and kissed him again.