[Disclaimer:I don't own any characters in this. The Shepard you see is the one I made for my own play-throughs, but the OC featured belongs to a friend of mine. If you want to know more about him, please look at lieutenant-constantine on tumblr (some content is NSFW/triggering, so please pay attention to the tags).]

They were close to extraction now. They just had to hold out until the shuttle came down to pick them up, but that would be a trial on its own. Swarms and swarms of husks and other various indoctrinated creatures were descending upon the small group. They had found what was left of the Primarch's son's platoon, and simply needed to wait until they could be picked up and moved to safety.

Shepard and Vega were pinned down under a chunk of road, which they had been using for cover. Shepard wanted to move from her hiding place and help her other teammate, but the threat of getting shot while trying to roll to different cover was too strong.

"Constantine!" she shouted above the din. "Stay down!" She didn't hear a response, but she saw him duck down, and figured that he had heard her. She tried to call Cortez, to see where he was, but she couldn't get through to him.

Her eyes went back to Michael to make sure he was still okay and then spotted something small getting lobbed towards him. He didn't seem to have noticed it, but it took Shepard only a moment to figure out what it was. Michael was standing up a bit, trying to get a few good shots in, and Shepard took her chances.

She leapt across the open space between their hiding places and managed to grab a hold of Michael, knocking him over and out of the way none too gently. The grenade went off, and they were only just out of range of it. They were close enough that Shepard could feel the small shockwave hit them.

It was only after did she realize that she was pretty much on top of Michael, and she quickly pulled away, rolling onto her feet and then dropping back down into a crouch.

"You all right?" she asked him.

"Yeah. Thanks," Michael said, rolling back into a crouching position.

—-

A few days had gone by since the mission on Tuchanka. Shepard had pretty much finished what she needed to do on that world. The genophage cure still needed to be distributed, but that was about it. She was a little worried about how that was going to go, but she wasn't going to let herself dwell on it.

She was sitting at the table in mess, feet propped up on the table. She was looking over a few things, trying to see what she had to do. She had a mug of coffee in her other hand, reading over the data pad with a bored expression on her face. She didn't hear Michael come into the room. Mess was empty at that hour, everyone having gone to bed for the night, or taken their shifts.

Shepard only looked up when she heard Michael sit down from across from her.

"Shouldn't you keep your feet on the floor?" Michael said in a slightly teasing tone. Shepard took a sip of her coffee.

"I'm the Commander. I can do what I want," she said with a small smile. Michael chuckled, and then leaned forward a bit. "Something you need, Constantine?"

"No, ma'am," he said.

"I thought I told you not to call me that," she said, letting her feet drop onto the floor. She set her data pad and coffee down. "Is there a reason why you're here, then? You're off for the night. You should be getting some sleep."

"I should say the same to you," Michael retorted.

"Touché," Shepard muttered. She rested her elbows on the table. "Okay, so you want to talk?"

"I just wanted to thank you for saving my ass back on Tuchanka," Michael said. "I probably would have come out of there worse off if you hadn't pushed me out of the way."

"Just doing what I can," Shepard said. She watched as Michael got to his feet and walked around to her side. She didn't like looking up at him that much, so she automatically got to her feet once he had reached her. He smiled slightly, and then lifted a hand to brush some hair that had fallen in front of Shepard's eyes out of the way. Normally, Shepard would have slapped the hand away, but she didn't want to this time.

"I still want to thank you," Michael said, seeming to be glad that Shepard hadn't taken his movement negatively. Shepard watched him lean in a little bit, his eyes staying on hers. Shepard brought a hand up to the side of Michael's face after a few moments. She wasn't exactly sure why she was doing this, but she didn't care. Michael smiled again, and then lightly brushed his lips against hers to see her reaction.

"So this is what you came to do, eh?" Shepard murmured.

"Yes." He then paused. "I'm sorry, did you not want me to? My apologies ma'am, I—" But Shepard silenced him with a long kiss, her hand going to the back of his head. Michael seemed a little surprised at first, but quickly relaxed and slid his arms around her as he closed his eyes and returned the kiss.

Shepard pulled away after a little while and smiled at him. "Satisfied?" she asked.

"I think so," Michael murmured, smirking a little. He gave her a brief kiss and then pulled away. "Shall I keep this between us?"

"Please," Shepard said. Michael nodded.

"Done and done," he said before giving Shepard one last little smile. He then left for the crew's quarters to settle down for the night.