Disclaimer: I do not own Mass Effect or any of its characters. They are products of BioWare, EA and certainly not me. This fan fiction is for entertainment purposes; no profit or intrusion of copyright is intended.

Shepard stirred, his body shifting slowly in the realm of half sleep. In the distance, a familiar feminine voice broke through the haze of exhaustion though its tone hushed in an attempt to be forceful yet quiet. "I've just submitted my report. We are heading to the Citadel now. The Normandy is in need of repairs and …"

The sound of a hissed exhale. "And where is Shepard? We received the information from EDI about the collector ship three hours ago. I've been calling him for the last forty minutes."

Shepard slowly licked his lips, eyes fluttering open. Still tired but thoroughly relaxed, he blinked a few times before opening his eyes. Haunting shadows dominated the room, compounded by the dimmed lighting, lower than usual as if turned low purposefully. He sat on the couch, legs spread and pillows pressed to his side assisting in comfort. The pain in his shoulder diminished to a throbbing ache.

"He is sleeping," Miranda responded firmly yet quietly. "He has been running on near exhaustion. I will wake him in three hours, before we get to the Citadel. But he has been wounded and needs time to recover."

"Fine, but I will need to brief him before the Citadel." Illusive man stated flatly then paused. "Where is Commander Shepard? He's not in his quarters."

"He's here, sleeping in the other room," Miranda answered without shame.

"I see. Miranda, I trust that we won't be having a problem?"

"Problem, sir?"

"Yes … a problem." A hissed exhale. "A situation."

"There is no problem." Miranda stated with firm conviction. "I promise you that."

"Good. I understand Commander Shepard … the Lazarus project is your … well, let's just say you've devoted a lot of time and energy. And you've done a remarkable job. But if you can't see this through, we can have you reassigned."

"With all due respect sir, there is no problem. This is my assignment and I will see it through."

"Good, that's what I like to hear." The Illusive man replied. "Nothing is to interfere with the mission. Nothing. The human race depends on Commander Shepard's success. The Reapers must be stopped … at all … costs."

"I understand."

"I will contact you in three hours. I expect Shepard in the communications room."

"Sir?"

"Yes?"

"The collector ship. Did you know that the distress call …"

"Yes." The Illusive man responded then disconnected the communication.

Miranda sighed. After a minute of silence, her chair moved slightly at her desk before her heels clicked softly along the floor as she walked into the private chambers.

Following her with his eyes, Shepard remained still when she crossed the room to stand at the foot of the bed. Her usual stoic and almost cold expression fell away as she stared at the sheets. Sighing, she leaned into her hip and raked a hand through her hair, burying it in the thick locks. He caught her engaging in the nervous habit on many occasions when she thought no one looked or when caught off guard. Her hand abandoned her hair to smooth over the bed even though not a single wrinkle disrupted the sheets.

"So …" Shepard drawled, interrupting her quiet thoughts.

Miranda glanced quickly to her side, surprised but not startled at his voice though her muscles tensed as if in preparation – a soldier's response. She calmed a second later but her controlled mask slipped back into place.

"What's it going to take to negate just about everything that asshole insinuated?"

"How long have you been up?" She deflected and turned to face him, silhouetted by the shadows.

"Long enough."

"How do you feel?"

A smirk tugged at the corner of his lips; he resisted the urge to let it spread. "Like my arms and legs are packets of medi-gel. But otherwise, fantastic."

"That's normal. It takes a couple of hours for the muscles to return to full use." She approached the couch, heels clicking and sat beside him. She reached for the clean bandage on the table.

He inhaled slowly and exhaled in relaxation, enjoying the slight lingering scent of her soap. Natural, clean and otherwise unscented, she used the standard soldier's soap distributed to every grunt at a barracks. No perfume; she didn't need it. He understood. A soldier never wore a scent; it gave away a position or risked detection. By the time an enemy smelled soap, it was too late.

Something else lingered around her. He sensed it on the few occasions she pressed close to him, sometimes in intimacy and sometimes because they took the same cover during battle. The air around her crackled with life … power … he couldn't place the words to describe it. She emanated energy, calm and almost cool control. In a strange clash of sensations, it both quieted and fired his senses, confusing and invigorating.

She fascinated him.

Miranda pressed one end of the bandage to his shoulder as she wrapped the fabric tightly around the joint, crossed his chest under the opposite arm and around to assist in support. "It's not as good as Doctor Chakwas can do, but it will suffice until you see her again."

"Feels just fine to me."

She stood, pacing away from him to stand by the window. Lost for words, she stood with her back to him, arms crossed.

"You do that a lot."

"What?"

Shepard extended his leg to stretch the muscle of one leg then the other. "Cross your arms. Defensive."

"I'm not defensive." She slowly uncrossed her arms, attempting for the action to appear casual and natural, not a reaction to his statement.

He chuckled softly and struggled to stand. His muscles resisted the movement at first before stabilizing. He walked towards her, injured arm close to his chest. Her shoulders tensed as he approached, pinched back. He paused a few feet from her, noting when she forced herself to relax. "You're on edge."

"There's a lot to do. I'm just thinking." She answered and stepped to the window, hands pressed against the indentation of the hull just beneath the firm plastic portal view.

"There's a lot on our plates right now," He commented softly.

She nodded slowly, eyes absently staring out the window for nearly a minute before speaking. "I always wanted to do great things, Shepard. Put all of my intelligence and abilities to work for a good cause. Not because my father expected it or because I was forced to do it, but because it was to make a difference. But I'm really no different from my father. I'm his legacy. I'm exactly what he created me to be."

"Why would you say that?"

"He invested every ounce of his energy into me." She responded with intensity. "He chose every gene, every hue, every nerve ending. From my muscles to my mind, looks, brains, personality. He picked and designed me trait by trait until I was the creation he desired." She peered back over her shoulder at him. "Exactly what I did to you."

"I don't see it that way," Shepard shrugged casually. "Not at all actually."

"What?" Surprised, she turned to face him. "How can you not?" She motioned to him with a hand. "Everything about you … I built you. I created you. You were a sack of … a pile of … you were just … degraded. You were dead, Shepard. Every muscle … every vein …"

"Regular Victor Frankenstein, bringing a corpse back from the dead." He teased.

She arched a brow. "You know classic literature."

"That surprise you a soldier may know such things?"

"A bit," she admitted. "The Alliance military isn't known for educating its soldiers in literature and art."

"They don't. But my mother found it important." He dared to step closer to her. "I don't even know your father, but from what you tell me about him I can say you're nothing like him. First of all, what he did to you was out of selfish narcissism; what you did to me was an assignment, not narcissism."

"That's not true." She interrupted before he could continue. She held his eyes, searching the dark blue depths. "You weren't just an assignment. You were an impossible assignment. Nobody had ever done what we were trying to do. At least not successfully. It was selfishness as my motivation. I had to prove that what we were trying to do could be done. That I was better than him, smarter than him." She brushed a gentle hand over his shoulder and down his arm. "And look at you. We did it. I … I recreated you from a pile of flesh and DNA strands to … well you."

His bicep twitched at her touch as he watched her expression. "We all have our personal motivations. Sometimes they're not heroic or romantic or even good. But it's what they motivate us to do that counts. So you have to think if the consequences and results outweigh the motivations and actions to get the goal. Well? Was the goal worth it?"

"What?"

He closed the distance between them, stalking closer until he was only a step away; she didn't retreat. "Am I worth it?"

She averted her eyes, staring past his shoulder before meeting his eyes again. "Of course. Look at how far we have come. We couldn't have come half this far if not for you."

"I think you give me too much credit."

"You don't give yourself enough." She sidestepped him and placed some distance between them. "I dedicated over two years of my life to you, Shepard. Before you even died. Cerberus wanted you. The Illusive Man saw what you did to defeat Saren and Sovereign. He knew you could do the same again and the Alliance kept dawdling and wasting you on frivolous foolish …" she tossed her hair and waved a hand in the air. "Ridiculous and useless missions. They had you hunting geth!"

"I know," he smirked and shook his head.

"Geth," she repeated, tone tinged with anger. "But before I … we could reach you. To try to talk to you, see if you would work for us, you were killed."

"Wait … before you?" Brow furrowed, curiously.

She sighed. "Yes. Me. My initial assignment after you defeated Sovereign was to recruit you. By any means necessary."

"Any means necessary?" He grinned, teasing. "I may have enjoyed that. So if I didn't listen to your reasons, would you have seduced me?"

She refused to seek his eye contact, keeping her back to him. "My instructions were any means necessary."

"I may have been hard to seduce then. Things were different."

"Seduction is more than sex, Shepard. Though I use my body to my advantage when necessary, it is not all I could have used to convince you. That's beside the point now. You died. And soon my assignment turned from recruitment to recovery. And finally reconstruction." Her voice softened as if the admission pained her to speak. "I spent every day …" then whispered. "Every day." Her back to him, her head ducked slightly to look opposite the room to a darkened corner of the hull. "And you're everything I could have hoped you'd be. Everything Cerberus could have hoped."

He swallowed hard as he watched her, the delicate shadows grazing her features, masking her in mystery and allure. He stared at her profile, captivated though his voice gave nothing away. "You always throw Cerberus in, as if to justify it against your own pride, desire or thought. I'm not interested in what Cerberus thinks. I'm interested in what you think." Slowly, he stepped away from the window towards her. "What did you do every day?"

"It wasn't easy." She answered softly and turned her head to watch him move before shifting her weight to face him. "Everything we had to do to not only bring you back to life but to build your body, your muscles, your organs. It was arduous and painstaking. Sometimes I thought it was useless … until I heard your heart beat. It … it was almost magical." She smiled softly.

"What's inside me? Am I … flesh? Am I even alive or is some machine keeping my heart pumping?"

"You're a little bit of everything. Your heart beats on its own, your organs function without any assistance, except your eyes. And you have some implants and cybernetics for other functions. Your skeleton, for example, has implants to keep it stabilized where the bone shattered and it wouldn't grow correctly."

"Why implants for my eyes? You grew other organs."

"It was the only way to ensure your eyes would work properly. We couldn't rejuvenate the organs and hope they would focus correctly and your distance and color perception would be perfect. It was the only way to guarantee when you opened your eyes, you'd see. So there is an implant not only in the retina but at the back of the brain to assist in your vision. You may even notice that what you see is clearer now than it ever was."

"So what am I seeing … is that how it actually looks? Are you how you appear to me or is it some trick of the implant?"

"All sight is subjective, Shepard. We may both look at the same battlefield and see two entirely different scenarios. It is about accuracy. Blue is blue, squares are squares. But we didn't make that initial implantation for your ears. If you couldn't hear when you awoke, that would be easy to fix with post construction surgery. Eyesight, however, proved more difficult to predict."

He nodded slowly, eyes distant in memory as he processed the information she openly related. "I remember Jacob saying that I was on the operating table for a better part of two years. But then … when you woke me up when the facility was under attack … how did I get up?"

"Ah," She paced to the couch and sat down. "Yes, your muscles weren't atrophied. That … took a lot of time and energy."

"What do you mean?" He sat curiously beside her. "How did you do that? I looked like I spent years in the training ring."

She hesitated, eyeing him with uncertainty. "It's … complicated."

"I think I deserve to know."

She sighed and leaned forward, twisted slightly at the waist to face him. "What I did to you earlier? With my biotics? I did that to you daily. Starting the day you arrived. It stimulated your muscle growth and usage, triggered the contraction so the muscles worked."

"Daily?" He inched closer to her. That explained the familiar sensation, the comfort and the pull he felt towards her. "Tell me more about that thing you did. Can all biotics do that?"

"No, no," she quickly shook her head. "Some Asari can, they have the control. I have never heard of another human doing it. If I push too hard, I can tear your muscle apart, right from the bone and shred it. And if the temperature isn't right, I can freeze it or burn it. It's about exactitude and discipline. I … I was trained to do that from a young age. I wasn't always as … good as I am now."

"What do you mean?"

Her eyes darted to the side in recollection. "It's a difficult skill to master and … when practicing …" she sighed. "Let's just say that many …" her jaw tensed a moment and she met his eyes, confident and proud. "Many animals and some … creatures and humans died before I learned exactly what I was doing."

Silence lingered a few secondss and Miranda shifted nervously as if judged. Shepard rested his arms on his knees, leaning forward as he stared at the table in front of him. "When you were doing that … whatever it's called, it … something felt so comforting and familiar about it."

She looked away from him as a small smile tugged at her lips. "Well … I did do it to you nearly every day for two years. Your muscles probably remember it."

He nodded seriously, brow narrowed in concentration. "And when I awoke the first time. At least the first time I remember. I remember seeing the lights, but it was kind of blurry. And then you and then that other guy and I can't … I don't remember what you said, but I remember the sound of your voice. What happened to me?"

"We were raising your dosage of stimulants to bring your blood pressure up, hoping to wake you from unconsciousness, but it was too much too fast. I almost wonder now if Wilson did it on purpose, to surge your system with stimulants until your heart exploded."

"He sabotaged your project."

"He wanted you dead," Miranda responded flatly. "I wasn't going to visit you that day, but I wanted to see your progress. That's when the alarms went off. It would be a prime opportunity for him to sabotage if he wanted to."

He smirked and slowly shook his head, glancing at her from the corner of his eye. "I've never been referred to as a mission before. Sabotaged. Progress."

"You were a mission." She stated seriously before playfully adding. "At the time."

He laughed. "At the time? Hmm? What now then?" He leaned closer to her teasingly.

She reached out, pressing a hand into his chest to keep him at bay though with very little force. "We shouldn't. The mission."

"Back to this, are we? Do we have a problem? A situation?" He mimicked the Illusive Man's tone. "Because it doesn't feel like a problem to me."

"Shepard …"

He pressed his good hand into the couch as he pivoted at the hips to move closer to her. "I know what you're thinking. And what you're worried about and it's not the damn mission. I'm not Niket. Or your father or the Illusive Man. You have to trust someone, Miranda, or you'll go insane."

"I know that," she snapped back, stiffening defensively. "I just … I don't need …"

"Yeah, you do need. You're still human. Is it so bad to want this? Or is it you don't want me."

She closed her eyes and swallowed hard. "I … I need time, Shepard. Please. Just … give me time." Her eyes opened, beseeching.

He held her gaze and after an unnerving moment, he nodded and eased back. "Alright. So how long do I have til the asshole calls again?"

She relaxed and sat up. "A few hours. You should sleep some more."

"Only if you do."

She pushed to her feet, tugging at the top of her boot near her thigh, adjusting it. "I'm exhausted."

He watched her, leaning back casually on the couch. "But does that mean you'll sleep? Or work through it; grab a caffeine supplement?"

She chuckled. "I'm quite tired. I'll sleep don't worry."

"Good," he pushed to his feet and stretched. "I'd be willing to stay if … you find the ship a little cold." He teased.

Her smile remained at his teasing. "Maybe … when I'm not so tired."

He slowly shook his head and sighed. "Shot down again. Damn, Garrus is so much better at this than I am." He took a step to her and slid a hand along her waist. "When the Illusive man calls, I'll let you know. Meet me in the com room afterwards, ok?"

"Aye, Commander,"

"You know, 'Sure, John' would also be alright."

"Ok, Shepard,"

He easily read the hint of a teasing smile through her stoic demeanor. When they first met, her teasing would have eluded him; the reason why she infuriated him. As the days passed, he grew to understand her nuances. "Close enough." His hand tightened on her waist as he leaned close, head tilted slightly as his lips pursed against hers in a soft and chaste kiss. His fingers moved slightly in a tender caress as he held the kiss a moment longer than he should.

She returned the kiss softly, her body failing to hold back the shiver at his tenderness.

His hand abandoned her waist to cup her cheek through the kiss before finally pulling back. "I'll see you in a few hours." Voice deep, husked.

Miranda nodded. "Aye, Shepard." She licked her lips as he turned from her and left the office. Her thin veil of control fell away and she sunk hard onto the bed, sitting roughly as she reached up to touch her mouth.

Note: Thank you so much for all the reviews. I meant to post earlier as per my promise, but sadly I was tied up and busy with the holiday season. Hope everyone has a wonderful 2012 and here's a chappy to start the new year. Keep the hits and reviews coming.