huh

For a moment she can’t decipher his expression, but then he shakes his head with something that could be a laugh, something that has Shepard rolling her eyes and her mouth rounding out the sound of a protest as he pulls her from the bar. Neither of them acknowledge Miranda where sits on the opposite side, watching them like they’ve forgotten about her, about the mission, about the array of prying eyes in this club, and her stance shifts to keep hers on them as Vakarian tugs her onto the dance floor spread across the better half of the lounge. She squints, keeping an eye out for the shock of red hair and his—what did turians call that, fringe?—between the haze of smoke and lights and tangle of limbs.

She’s watched human and asari flirt with her, or the occasional pass from a turian, and watched her diplomatically shut them down. Polite but firm, but no less disinterested. It had been ideal, in its own way: there was little room for any distractions now. Her previous interactions with Garrus Vakarian only ever showed her they were familiar with one another. Comfortable. But then Miranda watches as they cross over the dance floor, lost in a throng of bodies.

Interesting, she thinks, given Shepard’s inclination to avoid anything to do with dancing. The way the gap between them compresses until his arm slips around her waist and pulls her today him when she pantomimes preparing to flee.

Interesting, she decides, when she spots how close the two stand together. At glance, from what she can make of it, Shepard’s expression is puckered, hesitance and nerves playing across her face. But secure, too. A measure of trust following in the way her spine straightens, much in the same manner as when she gives the ground team one last nod before the shuttle doors open. His hands are on her shoulders, head bent toward her ear, and she shakes her head, but she does not step away.

He starts out trying to adjust her limbs, and Miranda almost snickers into her drink when he has to duck from getting elbowed. There were notes made in files about Shepard’s lack of coordination on the dance floor—interesting, too, given her prowess on the field. But those had been old chat logs amongst the ground crew, followed by debates over who owed what over tabs at Flux. One of his hands settles on her hip, familiar but close, and Miranda watches over the lip of her glass, curious.

The crowd shifts and she loses track of them for a moment—doesn’t see the way Shepard leans back into him, the concave of her spine following the convex of his keel. How she tilts her head, lip brushing the prong of a mandible as she murmurs to him about his dance moves. The hand low on her hip that pulls her too him before retreating up her side.

The crowd parts and they’re back in Miranda’s field of view, still close together and Shepard’s lips parted in a laugh she can’t hear over the music as he gets her to sway. Her arms raise, maybe under his encouragement, fingers glancing over his crest and fringe.

A peculiar development, she thinks, a sip of wine followed by the tilt of her head as he moves her. Shepard, this human—first human Spectre, the Hero of the Citadel and the Alliance’s golden goose, beguiled by a turian, of all species. All the sharp edges and points, all the remnants of the First Contact War and here she’s got one wound around her finger, even as his adjust an elbow and she leans into him.

Of course she would be contradictory, she thinks. Of course she would opt to go against the grain, flirting with the notion of—Miranda swallows another mouthful of wine. The way Shepard smiles is not one she’s seen before, even if some of her movements still have an edge of nervousness to them that she hasn’t seen on her before, either. Between the smoke and illicit substances, the pulse of the music that will have embedded itself in her eardrums even long after they’ve left the dock, and under the lights that cycle through a multitude of colors, Shepard looks alive.

Vakarian side steps an errant feet as she laughs, following a beat just a moment off, and his hand curls over her ribs. Lost somewhere in the haze of being part of a crowd, Miranda watches them, considers whether they were just two people out for the evening, and decides their mission is too critical for passing fancies that will likely end up with someone dead or distracted.

She finishes her wine and stands from the bar. She won’t say anything for now, she concludes; won’t pass anything along to the Illusive Man, but her memory can be long and their time can be short.