A/N Apologies for the delay of this chapter, it was a nightmare to write. Basically I re-wrote it from scratch, combines with the fact it was a really busy couple of weeks. I decided that I don't really like this sub-plot, it doesn't show enough with Miranda and Elizabeth, so I'm finishing it early in this chapter and moving onto bigger and better things next chapter.

Hopefully this is still an all right read though

3rd February 2191 – Crucible pulse + 4 years + 4 months

"Ready for this?"

"I think so," Shepard nodded. "Not my idea of a fun Friday night necessarily."

Miranda gave him a wink from the drivers seat of the skycar. "We can do that later."

"Not necessarily what I meant," He grinned back at her. "Though yes, good plan."

"Have you worked out exactly what you're going to say?"

"Well it isn't that simple, any question could be asked. At least this show is for the more intelligent audience, not just a celebrity chat show. People are meant to intelligently question me," Shepard stroked his chin in thought. "Though I reckon I know what they'll target."

"Let me guess, Cerberus, what it's like to be dead, what exactly happened after you got on the Beam," Miranda turned to him. "Me."

"Yep, pretty much," Shepard nodded. "Nail on the head there."

It was only a week after the official release of the hundreds of hours of Normandy footage, and it had broken sales records. Billions of copies sold on day one, with all the proceeds going to various charities set up since the end of the Reaper War, and it was the top topic of conversation in the streets. Of course not everything had been revealed, for example it had been said that they rescued Feron from the Shadow Broker and that Liara had been hired by the Shadow Broker rather than revealing her true identity to the entire galaxy. And, of course, nothing had been said of the events on the Citadel. Other than that almost everything was in public domain – the Council had agreed that everything should be made public.

"You're lucky it's Emily Wong doing the interview, you know."

"Why's that?"

"Well she's a very nice person, and a fair reporter," Miranda kept her eyes on the Citadel flight lanes as she explained. "Unlike other reporters you've dealt with, you know who I mean."

"Well Allers was all right."

"You only liked her because of her rather tight outfit," Miranda gave him a stern look. "I know how your mind works."

"Not true, I spent all my time thinking of you. And I only had her for morale," At Miranda's raised eyebrows Shepard realised what he had said and immediately back-pedalled. "Not for my morale of course, for getting support for the war effort and the like."

Miranda raised an eyebrow, challenging him with a look. "Sure."

"Honest."

"Right," On seeing the panicked look on Shepard's face Miranda relented. "John, I'm joking."

"Yeah you...I know." Shepard folded his arms with a huff, though after a few seconds he cracked a grin as well.

After a short pause Miranda spoke, this time far more tentatively. "John?"

"Yeah?"

"I did the right thing didn't I?"

"About what?" Shepard looked over at her with a confused expression.

"The stuff we put in the vid, about me," Miranda sighed. "I guess it's too late now."

Shepard hummed. "You having second thoughts?"

"I...sort of."

Shepard nodded with understanding, he knew what Miranda was thinking about. After much deliberation she had agreed to being fully in the released footage, from their mission to rescue Oriana to some of the conversations between them on the Normandy – even alluding to their escapades before the Omega 4 relay, all the way through to their precious few rendezvouses during the war. He had been very surprised that Miranda had said yes, it was a huge leap of faith for someone who had always been so closed off and private. Shepard had been half expecting her to request that she was almost cut out, but nothing beyond their most private moments had been omitted. It wasn't entirely unexpected that she would be having doubts.

"Miri, it was a very brave thing to do," He placed a hand on her thigh to reassure her. "I know it was a hard choice, but why then did you say yes?"

"Well, it would've been weird for the viewers. There would've been no explanation for our relationship, or for what happened on Sanctuary for that matter."

"Oh come on, we both know you would need a more serious reason than that."

"Fine, it was a little selfish to be honest," Miranda sighed. "I wanted everyone to see that I didn't desert you, that I helped you and stayed by your side when even those closest left you, that it was the miserable Cerberus bitch who cared for you rather than the apparently loyal Alliance marine."

"Wow," Shepard raised his eyebrows in surprise. "I wasn't expecting that. Though it isn't a dig at Ashley is it?"

"No, no. I just want people to know I guess," Miranda shook her head. "And also it would've been weird for people to not see anything between us during the vid and then suddenly we're together with a child now, that would lead to more questions for us I guess."

"Exactly. You have plenty of reasons, all justifiable," He gave her a reassuring smile. "And I bet you can come up with just as many downsides in as little time."

"Yep. People knowing everything about me, people seeing Oriana as a way to get to me, people knowing about my past, revealing emotions to billions of inhabitants of the galaxy, people realising I almost cost the galaxy the war by nearly getting you killed on Sanctuary..."

"OK, OK," Shepard stopped her mid flow. "I didn't mean for you to list them all, that doesn't help. And you did not nearly get me killed on Sanctuary."

"Well I kind of did, if I had of contacted you then you wouldn't have been going toe to toe with a trio of brutes on your own."

"I had the squad." Shepard protested.

"You pretty much left them behind." Miranda countered him.

"Well you saved Oriana and I saved you, that's all that matters." Shepard patted her leg and leaned in to give her a kiss on the cheek.

"Mmm," Miranda moaned before slapping him away with a playful hand. "Don't disturb me while flying please, I don't want to crash."

"Hang a right here."

Miranda gave him an exasperated expression. "I know!"

She swung the skycar right and headed underneath an arch, the massive hanger doors swinging open to allow them into the private back entrance of the Citadel studios. Miranda set the skycar down next to a row of others, giving him a customary eye roll before they climbed out. As they did Shepard noticed a large vid screen on the nearby wall displaying a wildlife program currently on one of the channels.

"Hey Miri, there's a badger on the screen!"

"Oh god," Miranda rolled her eyes. "Lets hope it doesn't attack us."

Shepard chuckled, the adoption of the badger didn't exactly go to plan. Less than half an hour after it had been in the house Shepard and Miranda had sat down to watch a vid curled up on the sofa with a large bowl of popcorn, and the badger wasn't happy that it hadn't been offered any. Now the beast was hopefully miles away from the house, Shepard had managed to pin it, cage it, and dump it several valleys away.

"That one looks more friendly, I don't think it would betray it's saviours.

XXXXXXXX

"So, ready to do this?"

"Think so," Shepard nodded to Emily who was opposite him on her large comfy chair. He was on a matching sofa, a table in between with glasses of water for both of them. "Yes, I am."

"Right," Emily nodded with a kind smile before turning to look over at the director of the show. He flashed a couple of hand signals to her before she turned back to Shepard. "Ten seconds till we're live, and remember – any subjects you can't broach and just flash the safe sentence."

"Got it."

The front of house lights dimmed and the audience began to clap, though it was a civilised and respectful clap without any yelling or whooping. As the director counted down the last few seconds Emily turned to the main camera with a smile.

"Good evening viewers, welcome to Citadel News of the Week. The show where you find out what you want to know, straight from the news' source," Emily paused. "Tonight we are very honoured to have Councillor Shepard with us, speaking about his experiences that have recently been shared for the first time with the rest of the galaxy. Thank you for being here."

"Great to be here Emily."

"So we have many questions for you Councillor, as you may have guessed. Later on we will have some questions from our audience, but first I have some of my own," Emily picked up her data-pad and thumbed through it as she continued to talk. "Of course it's difficult to know where to start, of course we don't have the very beginning as the production shows events from the Normandy SR-2."

"Yeah, the majority of this footage was pieced together and rendered by EDI – the AI on-board the SR-2," Shepard explained. "We couldn't get hold of much footage from the mission chasing Saren, but the details of that will also be released to the public soon."

"I see," Emily nodded. "So firstly I want to thank you, obviously for saving us all, but also for what you've done for me personally. A lot of people wouldn't have realised that you spent a lot of time during these missions helping out individuals with seemingly unimportant issues, you gave me access to some rather important data on criminal activity in the wards back in eighty-six that allowed me to make my break into the media."

"Aye, I remember that."

"Well you've also done a whole series of small issues, from giving an Asari dating advice about her Krogan boyfriend to encouraging refugees to help the war effort," Emily furrowed her brows. "The incredible thing is that you were constantly juggling all these small tasks alongside the big and more important issues, always keeping everybody in your mind. I have to ask...Why?"

"Because..." Shepard scratched his head, he wasn't so sure exactly why he had done all of those things – for example dealing with Conrad Verner. "I think if I had of spent all of my time dwelling on the Reapers then my head would probably of exploded, or I would've slipped into depression. I think that sometimes a distraction was useful, not just for me but for the entire team. Otherwise it would've just been too much pressure, that's why we also tried to get bits and pieces of downtime when we could during the war – to keep everybody from being too highly strung."

"I suppose it makes sense."

"And of course I'm a bit of a nosey person, it's hard for me to resist sorting out a problem if I hear about one," Shepard chuckled. "Though maybe that was irresponsible."

"Oh no, I think it's fantastic," Emily paused as she scrolled down on her data-pad. "But onto a more serious issue, your time with Cerberus."

"Right," Shepard nodded. "I was expecting this to come up."

"Well there was an awful lot of speculation as to what actually happened to you when the Normandy was destroyed and you reappeared two years later. Some people thought you were killed, others thought you were undercover, some people genuinely believed you were with Cerberus," Emily shook her head in disbelief. "The actual truth is staggering, it must have taken a lot to get your head around."

"It was, it still is actually," Shepard quietened for a moment, looking up to see Miranda looking on with a concerned face from behind the main camera. Shepard zoned back into the room at her supporting nod. "I didn't have much time to take it all in after I first woke up, I was just thrown straight into the Collector mission and then the war. I didn't get the opportunity to actually think about things until after the war was over, and even now it's staggering to...to contemplate what happened."

"It must be," Emily carefully voiced her next question. "I can appreciate you not wanting to answer this, but do you remember anything between the events over Alchera and waking up on the Lazarus station?"

"No, absolutely nothing," Shepard shook his head, and he was answering truthfully – he had spoken at length to Miranda about this. "There may well be something after death, but I don't remember experiencing it. I've discussed this with an expert, and they explained it to me. In the layman's terms that I understand memories are stored as electrochemical pulses or signals in the brain, but as I was brain dead anything that I experienced after clinically dying would not have been recorded."

"So we don't yet have the answer to – is there a soul?"

"Seemingly not." Shepard gave Emily a glance to get her to move off the topic.

"So perhaps we should move onto the topic of the Collector mission," Emily paused. "So Cerberus? We've seen what it was like when you worked with them, but what did it feel like? How was it for you?"

"Different. At first it was awful, I found myself in a new place with people I didn't know or trust, not exactly sure of whether I was who I though I was, not really knowing what the hell was going to happen in the future," Shepard stroked his chin as he remembered the early days of the mission. "It was difficult, I wanted to try to trust and work with the crew but I couldn't get past the fact that they were Cerberus – we shut down a hell of a lot of gruesome and failed Cerberus experiments during the chase for Saren."

"From what we could see they seemed like a very good crew, willing to work with you," Emily stopped as she seemed to remember something. "Though of course that was The Illusive Man's intention, right?"

"So it seems," Shepard nodded. "But I think that was his mistake. He gave me such a good crew, one that genuinely wanted to work with me, that they all left him behind."

"Yes, that's quite amazing. Though some of it must be down to you," Emily gave him a kind smile. "From what everyone says you are a rather compelling person to work with."

"Maybe, I try my best to get on with people. And I thought that I would continue that when I begun the Collector mission, despite the fact the crew were Cerberus. Someone had to fight the Collectors, and Cerberus was the only organisation doing that. To those ends, I had to make the team work," Shepard flashed a grin to Miranda who was watching him like a hawk. "Even with the most prickly of characters."

"So did Cerberus not seem like an evil organisation back then?"

"It's not as black and white as that, as I found out," Shepard inwardly chuckled at the irony, The Illusive Man had once said something almost exactly the same. "Like I said, we ran into Cerberus a few times whilst chasing Saren and the stuff we saw was pretty horrific. We were all firmly convinced that they were evil."

"But?"

"But it wasn't a true representation of the entire organisation. There were many good people in that organisation, not just who I worked with but many other individuals," Shepard stroked his chin lightly. "And I don't think the rest was that evil either, at least not to begin with. I think the Illusive Man set out with a good set of ideals, perhaps even a noble purpose, but his errors were in the execution of those goals."

"So you reckon he was once fighting truly for the good of humanity?"

"Yes, but without any regard for non-humans. And perhaps with a lesser regard for what we would consider to be morally right," Shepard nodded, he was actually convincing himself at that moment in time. And he was surprised to notice Miranda nodding in agreement to him with the slightest incline of her head. "But he lost his way, and the Reapers exploited that to turn us against ourselves, to make their job easier."

"A lot of people have said that they can't see past what Cerberus did in the war, that they are inherently evil. But I suppose you have the insight that we all lack," Emily summarised before changing the topic. "So you were with Cerberus begrudgingly, and had picked up the beginnings of a team including your old friend Garrus Vakarian, and then you went to the Council. And they dismissed you again, despite Saren's attack on the Citadel, despite Sovereign."

"That was a downer, it was really difficult for me – especially after what happened on Horizon, though I'm not going to go into that now," Shepard hadn't been keen on talking about Ashley live to the entire Citadel. In fact he didn't want to talk about any of his personal life, though that would be almost impossible he knew. "The Council had butted heads with me during the entire of the Saren mission, and I was right every time. Obviously I knew I was right that time as well, but it was infuriating."

"Did you think they would help you?"

"Well I was hoping they'd do something. Obviously they couldn't acknowledge a threat like the Reapers publicly that far in advance – it would cause havoc – but they could've done something in secret. The Shadow Broker and Cerberus both prepared in secret, the Council could've done the same thing with the SPECTRES perhaps. Just something."

"A lot of people have directed some heavy, and perhaps justified, criticism towards the old Citadel Council this week. To be frank many people are surprised that they are still in office considering what they did."

"I can understand that, in a way I wanted them gone too, but they were in a tricky position, nothing public could be done," Shepard sighed. "But there's no point holding onto old grudges, what's happened has happened. All of them know they did wrong, and they're making amends now. I know it's too late, but if people hold onto past mistakes then we're never going to progress."

"I believe you're right there," Emily nodded. "So, we're going to take a quick break now, we'll be back in five," As the adverts began to roll she turned to him. "We're going to start with some queries about the end of the Collector mission and Bahak if that's OK."

Shepard didn't answer, instead he leaned back in the sofa, taking a long drink of water whilst sighing internally.

XXXXXXXX

"So after defeating the Collectors you took only a very small break to repair the Normandy before heading off again, continuing your mission with your squad without any direction from Cerberus."

"That's right, we didn't want to sit around idle at all," Shepard nodded. "The main problem came that we had no back up at all – no back up in political pull, military force, or financial backing."

"So how did you decide what to do? Did you have any ideas about the Reapers at the time?"

"Nothing really, nothing beyond the fact we knew Harbinger was coming with the entire Reaper fleet at some stage. The only intel we had access to was what we had previously gathered, and the limited data Liara was provided for her work for the Shadow Broker," Shepard carefully finished off the previous sentence, well aware that Liara's identity was meant to be a secret. He moved on quickly. "So we agreed that the best way of finding anything out was to be on the move, to actively sniff anything out that we could. In addition we were sure that Cerberus were now gunning for us, as well as potential hostility from the Alliance and the Council."

"And it was then that you contacted by Admiral Hackett about Bahak."

"Yep. We had spent the best part of a month scooting around the Terminus doing various missions, the majority of which was cleaning up groups of mercs though we did find some interesting stuff. For example, a mining facility overrun by husks because of unearthed Reaper tech," Shepard realised he was rambling and caught himself. "But yeah, it was about a month after when he informed me of Kenson's situation."

"And you went alone? That must have been difficult to organise with such a loyal team."

"Well I did want to take a couple of the guys with me, but I had to stick to Hackett's request," Shepard scratched the back of his neck as he remembered the days planning that mission. "I informed the team that I was going alone and that was final. They all agreed to my decision, but we planned the infiltration of the prison together to create the best possible plan of action."

"And of course by this stage your relationship with Miranda Lawson was rather serious, did it have much of an effect on her? The footage released to us hinted at some friction..."

"Well...erm..."

Shepard paused for a second, remembering the moment he had informed Miranda of the planned mission. He hadn't been sure of how she was going to react, whether she had indeed changed that much by that stage that she would be concerned beyond a professional level. To his surprise Miranda said nothing to him, she had only nodded awkwardly and muttered something about having to check on the stockpiles of ammunition for the Thanix Cannon. He didn't see her for the rest of the day despite searching extensively for her – and that was a feat on a ship as small as the Normandy.

The next time he saw her was later in the evening in their cabin, and she had insisted on being perfectly fine, that she understood why he had to go, but whilst Shepard fell asleep easily Miranda stayed awake all night, gripping his hand with her own. Shepard had woken up with bloody nail marks over his hands in the morning.

"Councillor?"

Shepard looked up, shaking himself out of the reverie. "It was difficult, rather personal."

"I understand," Emily picked up on his unease and moved straight on, though it wasn't as if she was moving onto an easier topic. "So after rescuing Kenson, travelling to the asteroid, being imprisoned by Kenson, and breaking out of prison you learnt the truth about Object Rho and the Alpha Relay."

"It was...staggering," Shepard frowned. "You have no idea how terrifying a thought it was, mere hours until the Reapers had access to the galaxy's back door."

"Out of curiosity, how strategically important was the Alpha Relay?"

"As the name suggests, it's ridiculously important," Shepard explained. "It would've allowed the Reapers to be able to strike anywhere in the galaxy, through any relay."

"So it had to be destroyed?"

"There was no other option, there really wasn't," Shepard shook his head sadly. "If there had been a way to save the people of the system then I would've, but there was no other resort. Once Kenson and her team were indoctrinated the Project was all but doomed. It was lucky that she got arrested so that Hackett sent someone there, otherwise the Reapers would've slipped in without any of us being any the wiser. We would never have survived."

"We saw in the footage that you tried to contact the citizens of the system, to try and warn them."

"I had to try, I couldn't just leave them without any hope."

"Well I hope the Batarians can see that it was a necessary sacrifice, a horrific one to make, nut necessary nevertheless."

"I'll never forget having to do that, I wish there had of been another way."

XXXXXXXX

"So Thessia was a horrendous blow for you, not just tactically and strategically, but also morally and emotionally."

"It was one of those moments, one of the worst defeats I've ever had. We were so close," Shepard almost felt a surge of anger at the memory of Kai Leng's leering face as he strode off with the Prothean VI in his hand. "It was brutal, and seeing the remaining Reaper forces descend on what remained of the Asari forces was just the icing on the cake, it was horrific."

"And at the time did it feel like that was it? That it was all over?"

"Almost. Thessia had been one of the planets I thought would hold out for longer, but the Reapers annihilated the Asari defence," Shepard gave her a grim look. "And losing Thessia, coupled with losing the VI, felt like it was all my fault. And we had no way of discovering the Catalyst. I thought I lost us the war on Thessia."

"Despite that, you managed to get the VI back, after a stop at Sanctuary – possibly the most disgusting thing I've ever heard of."

"Well we were all rather disheartened after Thessia, and a little angry. I wanted nothing more than to kick Kai Leng's smug face in. It was thanks to Specialist Traynor that we got the rumour about Sanctuary," Shepard furrowed his brows. "And we went from one nightmare into another."

"Of course Sanctuary was a rather difficult mission for you personally," Emily gave a quick glance towards Miranda before looking back at him. "In more ways than one."

"I guess you're referring to Miranda there."

"Yeah," Emily chuckled. "I bet all the girls watching want a white knight to come and rescue them like that."

"Ironically Miranda is one of those girls that isn't really desperate for a white knight," Shepard noticed the eye rolling from Miranda's direction before continuing. "But it wasn't a pleasant mission in any sense at all. The fact it was a husk factory was bad enough, but with Miranda being there as well...it was terrifying for me."

"It must have been horrendous," Emily nodded sympathetically. "But what you did was incredible, and as well as rescuing her you got the data needed to finally locate and end Cerberus HQ."

"It wasn't particularly easy on my health I'll tell you that," Shepard chuckled. "Had to take a few days off to recover."

"I bet it was a relief to have Miss Lawson back on the Normandy for you."

"It made a big difference," Shepard nodded, making eye contact with Miranda in the audience once more, meaning every word he said. "I'm not sure I'd have managed to get through to the end without her with me."

XXXXXXXX

Miranda stole a quick glance at Shepard next to her in the skycar. As per usual she was piloting. Unlike normal however, Shepard was rather quiet.

"Want to talk?"

He sighed, and spoke a little bitterly. "I've done enough talking for one day."

She reprimanded him with a frown. "That was a little acrimonious John."

"Sorry," He looked down. "I didn't mean that."

"Good," She nodded. "Now talk, you wouldn't let me sulk."

"I just..." Shepard paused. "I've not spoken to many people about all of that stuff, only you, Garrus, maybe Liara. And now I've blurted my opinion to the entire Citadel."

"Wasn't that the point of this?"

"Well yes," Shepard placed his head in his hands. "I just...forgot...how difficult it is to...talk about it. Bahak, Cerberus, everything."

"I was surprisingly comfortable with what was mentioned about me," Miranda gave a wry grin. "Six years ago I would've been horrified."

"I know."

"Oh, come one John," Miranda gave him a supportive smile. "We agreed that this was a good idea. It answers most of the questions that people have, removes the speculation."

"I know."

"I was thinking as I watched you. Thinking about everything that we went through," Miranda let out a low whistle. "It's all crazy, but it was all worth it."

"I know."

"Stop saying you know!" Miranda rolled her eyes at him before turning back to the lane in front of her as she banked the skycar down towards the parking area of the Silversun Strip. ]

Shepard gave her a sheepish look. "Sorry."

"God you're in a funny mood," Miranda shook her head as she parked the skycar, shutting down the engine and turning to him. "Seriously, you did really well tonight. It was a really good idea, worth losing a bit of privacy over."

Shepard raised an eyebrow. "So you've decided you're happy with being in the vid?"

"Watching you tonight only convinced me more that it was the right thing to do," She leaned forwards to give him a quick kiss on the lips. "Now come on, lets get home."

The pair left the skycar and headed towards the lift of Tiberius Towers, selecting the floor for the flat. Miranda leaned into Shepard as they waited for it to ascend, flashing him a smile. He reciprocated by placing an arm around her shoulders, resting his head on top of her own. When he spoke she could feel his throat rumbling against her head.

"There's something I want to know."

"What?"

"How hard was Bahak for you? Whilst I was gone?"

She spun in his arms, stroking his cheek softly. "Is this what's bothering you?"

"Ish."

"I was worried, yes," She turned back again, leaning against him once more. "I had just got you, I had two things in my life I really wanted. That I loved. And I was terrified I'd lose you."

"Why did you let me go?"

"Because I knew what was at stake," She slipped one hand into his own, pulling him out of the lift as the doors opened. "You said yourself, we wouldn't have stood a chance if the Reapers had of come through the Alpha Relay. I don't think I could let you go now, but like I told you before – the mission always had to come before us. Both the Collector mission and the war."

"That's what I suspected."

"But I almost tried to stop you from going," Miranda sighed. "As your shuttle left I tried to grab the other one and go down, at least so you'd have someone else with you."

Shepard stopped outside the front door to the apartment. "How come you didn't?"

"Garrus stopped me, he said that you'd be fine and that I'd complicate the mission. That I was too emotionally important to you to go on missions with you, " Miranda huffed. "The bloody Turian was right as well."

Shepard raised an eyebrow. "Wait, what? He said that you shouldn't go on missions with me?"

"Not exactly, but what he implied was right. From the Collector base onwards you put yourself in more danger than necessary to protect me," Miranda noticed that he was going to protest but she continued onwards. "And Sanctuary proves that, don't dispute it."

"I..." Shepard opened his mouth a couple of times before frowning. "Bloody Turian, he was right."

"Hmm," Miranda rolled her eyes. "Now come on, enough with this emotional crap. I suspect we'll get a nice surprise when we open the door."

At Shepard's questioning glance Miranda winked, turning to the door. She scanned her thumbprint and retina on the central panel but didn't open the door automatically. Instead she slowly and quietly prised open the doors, scanning around the apartment as she slowly entered.

"Aha!" She pointed an accusatory finger at the couple on the sofa who burst apart with surprise. "I knew it!"

"Randa!" Oriana gave her sister a panic stricken look as she sat bolt upright on the sofa, buttoning up her blouse. "We weren't expecting you to be back so soon."

"Oh really?" Miranda slowly advanced on the pair, one eyebrow raised. Shepard was chuckling whilst Oriana tried to suppress her own grin. Thomas, Oriana's boyfriend, was keeping his eyes straight down on the floor in front of him – he was still rather terrified of Miranda. "You know it's not very nice to make out on someone else's sofa."

Oriana shrugged. "Hey, you make out all the time!"

"It's our house!" Miranda crossed her arms, throwing her weight on one hip. She turned to look at Thomas. "And just how far were you planning on taking this tonight?"

He panicked. "Erm...I..."

"Randa!" Oriana scolded her older sister, standing up. "We're both consensual adults in our mid twenties, we can do what we like!"

"Fine, whatever," Miranda shook her head. "Is Elizabeth in bed?"

"Yeah, she was great tonight." Oriana nodded.

As Miranda nodded something else caught her eye, the arrangement of some of her work files on one of the shelves in front of them – they weren't in alphabetical order.

"What happened to my files?"

"Oh? You noticed?" Oriana looked up in surprise. "Sorry, Lizzie was demonstrating her biotics to us but she accidentally threw some kind of biotic field at the shelves by accident. It was really funny actually."

"Hmm," Miranda approached the files to rearrange them, sorting them through alphabetically. "I'm trying to get her responsibly trained before she starts school in September, schools frown upon untrained biotic kids. They cause havoc."

Shepard had a bemused expression over the other side of the room. "Miri, knocking a few files over is hardly that bad."

"Yes but what if another four year old was underneath all those files?" Miranda gave him a serious look. "It would hurt."

Shepard nodded. "I suppose I can understand that."

"Good," Miranda turned back to double check her files were in order before going to stand back by Shepard. "Now lets get out of these clothes, you really look like you want to jump out of that suit."

"Too true," Shepard grinned at her, Oriana and Thomas sharing a bemused look. "See you two in a bit."

As Shepard made off Miranda moved to follow, giving the young couple a stern look. "Yes, and no snogging on our sofa!"

As they headed up the stairs Shepard whispered to Miranda.

"Why are you being so harsh on them? Like Oriana said, they're both consensual adults."

"Because..." Miranda leaned in closely with a grin. "It's good practice for the future..."

A/N So thanks for sticking with me on this, read, review, comment , and leave ideas if you'd like to – it's always really appreciated.