A/N - It's been a while since I've written a lovely Kaidan/femShep oneshot, but I got really inspired with this fic and I couldn't resist writing a story set after the hardship of Thessia that shows just how much Shepard really needs Kaidan to ground her. I wrote this for the lovely TowardBlue and it uses her Vera Shepard. I hope you enjoy this - it's very fluffy, and I'm really proud of it.

"In that book which is my memory,
On the first page of the chapter
That is the day when I first met you,
Appear the words, 'Here begins a new life'."

- Dante Alighieri, Vita Nuova

The Citadel was the busiest that Vera Shepard had ever seen it, and refugees spilled out across the civilian docks and into the Alliance areas. Families huddled together, scruffy loners begged for credits in the walkways, and babies, as though sensing the barely restrained panic in the air, cried out fearfully from time to time. C-Sec officers patrolled constantly, yelling at the refugees and attempting to corral them back into their allocated areas.

A futile gesture, as there clearly wasn't room for them all.

Vera paused in the elevator that led from the Normandy's private dock, pushing her blonde hair behind her ears as she glanced around carefully. Seeing no one she knew, she gave herself a small shake and pulled the cap she wore lower over her eyes, then stepped out into the teaming throng of frightened people.

The last time she'd been here the place had been full to bursting, but with the latest influx of asari asylum seekers, the Citadel was now at crisis point. She could feel the tension in the air, the sense that something was about to give, and, not wishing to be part of it, she walked through the docks as fast as she possible; side stepping the grasping hands of urchins and forcing herself to look away from the hollow-eyed faces of homeless children.

This is your fault, a voice hissed in the back of her mind. Your fault for not stopping Leng on Thessia.

She shook her head and increased her pace. It had been easy to slip away from the Normandy once they docked on the Citadel; to send a message to EDI that she was on Spectre business and then shed her usual N7 hoodie like she had shed her bloodied, pock-marked armour after Thessia. Simple really, to cast aside the one thing that marked her as Commander Shepard, that small N7 symbol, and instead wear a simple Alliance uniform.

Today she was just another soldier.

No one would know who she was.

No one would miss her.

… Except for Kaidan.

Vera bit her lip as she reached the far side of the docks and hit the button for the elevator that would take her away from the tangle of people and overwhelming cacophony of noise.

Kaidan would know there was no urgent Spectre business calling her away and would know something was up. Hell, he knew Thessia had upset her far more than she had let on to the others. He'd held her the previous night when she had lain awake for hours, tortured by memories of the asari commando's as they screamed over the comms for help.

She flinched as the elevator arrived, and stepped in quickly, punching a random button in her haste to get away.

Vera sighed. If anyone was likely to realise why she'd left and come after her, it was Kaidan. Not because he didn't respect her need to be alone and process things, but because he was so damned good natured that he couldn't help but want to be there for people when they needed a shoulder. And she loved him for it, but right now she needed to get away from everything.

The elevator whisked her downwards and emptied her out onto the presidium level, where she moved through the crowd with a liquid grace. She was good at moving, good at running, good at always forcing a path forward through whatever difficulty got in her way. Like a shark, she had to keep moving forward no matter what. If she stopped moving, if she let herself feel for a moment, part of her worried that everything would catch up with her all at once, and she'd drown in those feelings.

Like I'm drowning now? She wondered as the screams of those asari commandos echoed in her mind.

She was no stranger to death. It had dogged her all her life; starting with the death of her family on Mindoir, then the death of her squad on Akuze, and death had slowly picked off her friends over the years until she'd learned that moving forward was the only way to survive without going mad. You kept your head down, your eyes forward, and you kept fighting no matter who went down around you.

Or so she'd always told herself.

It was her team on board the Normandy, her friends, that had changed everything. They had become her family, and each time she lost one of them it hurt just a little bit more. Ashley, Mordin, Thane and Legion. Their names were etched on the wall of the Normandy in honour of their sacrifice, but they may as well have been carved on her heart. She missed them. And it shook her to know how close she'd come to losing Kaidan on Mars, and to realise that she still might still lose him in this war.

Thessia had been her chance to turn things around. Her chance to get the data the Alliance needed, to find out what the Catalyst was and save the day, and instead she had let Kai Leng beat her. She may as well have doomed them all. Sure, Traynor was tracking his flight path and was hopeful of finding him, but that would take time, and each second that slipped by meant that more people were dying. More lives were being lost because of her mistake.

God, she was tired of all the death.

Vera rubbed the back of her neck, trying to release her stiff muscles. She was tired of running and fighting, tired of there always being one more emergency that needed her attention, tired of waking up exhausted and of having no time to hold Kaidan and show him the attention he deserved. They'd all been through hell, each and every one of them, and sometimes she wanted to stop time and just hold him.

To be with him in a moment and not have to worry about anything disturbing them.

No death or reapers or duty.

Around her, happy couples and families strolled as though oblivious to the starving desperate people in the docking bays above them. It was as though they were oblivious to the war going on. As though the recent attack on the Citadel had been a mild inconvenience and they believed themselves to be untouchable.

Vera kept walking, through the throngs of people stuffing their faces and spending their money, past asari sipping cocktails and wearing silk, pushing between salarians having petty arguments with volus about credit funds. All of it made her sick, and she turned up the nearest stairwell, hurrying away from the elite of the galaxy and their deluded way of life. All the disgusting wealth down here while people were starving and dying in the docks above made her sick.

She walked until her head spun and she'd taken so many turns and gone up so many flights of stairs that she didn't know where she was; until she couldn't have been on Mars or Jupiter for all she knew. Though when she took a moment to orientate herself, the corridor stretching ahead of her was familiar and filled with more of the type of people she wanted to avoid; the rich and affluent. Those who couldn't care less about what was happening to the rest of the galaxy so long as their own lives weren't disrupted.

The Embassies stretched around her, and, desperate to get away from these people and find some peace, Vera hurried to the door to the Spectre offices. It was almost always empty. Always quiet. Always peaceful. Perfect. She opened the door and slipped in quietly, thankful that no one she knew had seen her and stopped to chat.

"Vera?"

That voice.

That wonderful husky voice.

She froze, her back pressed to the door as a figure lounging across the room near the terminals straightened and faced her. A million emotions flashed through her as the familiar silhouette closed the distance between them, the hum of his biotics flickering delicately over her skin like the familiar hand of a lover. For a moment her heart stuttered in her chest, then longing and relief flooded her as she realised this was where she wanted to be; with him.

"Kaidan." Vera let out the breath she'd been holding and pushed away from the door, meeting him halfway. "I thought you were still on the Normandy?"

He smiled, a small flash of teeth in the dim light. "Well, I was. But you weren't the only one who had some "Spectre business" to take care of."

"I see. So you followed me?" She crossed her arms over her chest, unable to be cross with him even though she wanted to be.

His smile widened. "No, unlike you I actually had some paperwork to file." Kaidan caught her hand and they walked further into the offices together. "But I figured you'd show up here eventually, so I waited."

Vera tightened her fingers around his and the tension she'd been holding in her shoulders eased. "I'm glad you did."

Kaidan led her over to the terminal where he was indeed in the process of officially filing and closing reports, and with a pang of guilt, she thought of the reports she still had open from the last time she'd been on the Citadel. The missions were completed, but she wasn't half as diligent as Kaidan when it came to paperwork. She started to drift over to the spare terminal but Kaidan was still holding her hand, and he gave a small shake of his head.

"Oh, no you don't. I'm done here. Just let me send these off and then we'll talk."

"Talk?"

His eyes flicked up to hers as he hit the send button and the terminal beeped approvingly. "Yeah, I think it's time you and I had a talk about a few things. Plus," he raised her hand to his lips and pressed a kiss to her palm, "I promised Chakwas I'd sit you down and talk to you."

"Oh-oh," she feigned terror, though her stomach was turning nervously.

His hand squeezed hers and he smiled again. "A good talk, I promise."

They found an interview office and sat down together. Kaidan produced a thermos of coffee – strong and black; just how she liked it - and poured a cup into the lid. He pushed it across the desk to her, and Vera blew on the steaming liquid, watching ripples spread across the top and trying to still the churning of her stomach.

"Tell me about today," he invited, his husky voice soft and pleasant. As always there no pressure, no expectation; just an invitation.

For a heartbeat Vera hesitated, trying to think of how she could find the words to describe the horror of her past and the fears she held for her future, but with a deep breath she knew she didn't have to. Kaidan would understand why she felt as she did; he knew her better than anyone in the galaxy.

He always had.

"I had to get away," she started, her voice unsure. "Everyone keeps looking to me for the answers and expecting me to save the day, and on Thessia … ," Vera spread her hands wide, " … I didn't. I couldn't save the data we needed. I couldn't save the commandos who sacrificed their lives getting us to the temple. I couldn't even stop Kai Leng from walking in and beating me in a fight. I failed. And back at the Normandy people were starting to do it again, you know?"

Kaidan nodded. "You mean about tracking Leng down?"

"Yeah, Traynor had her idea and we put it in motion, but there was never any doubt that I would find him and get the data back. They just put their faith in the Normandy. In me." She let out the breath she was holding and struggled not to let the tears welling behind her eyes creep forward. "What if it doesn't work, Kaidan? What if we fail and we can't build the Catalyst? What is the Crucible is useless because of me?"

She could see it in her head; all the billions of people who would die because of her stuff up. Bodies littering the streets, broken and bloodied, just as they had on Mindoir and Akuze. Vera flinched at the memories and swallowed the bile rising in her throat, hastily sipping on the coffee, savouring the strong bitter taste as the memories faded with the fear.

"We won't fail," Kaidan said softly, and he reached across to brush a lock of her blonde hair out of her eyes, tucking it behind her ear. "We'll find Kai Leng and stop him because we're a great team. This isn't you against the reapers anymore. It's us against the reapers. It's you and me, it's Traynor, it's Vega, it's Joker. It's all of us. You're not alone." His eyes, so warm and golden, met hers and the certainty in them took her breath away. "Whatever happens, you're not in this alone."

Vera sighed in relief and rubbed her eyes. "Shit, you always know just what to say, don't you?"

"One of my many talents." Kaidan returned her smile. "I mean it though, I know it might feel like the pressure is all on your shoulders, but share some of the burden; you have a great team. And they want to help you."

"I know, and I do. But it's not just the stress and pressure. I'm so tired," she admitted. "I can't sleep, and when I do I just see the faces of all the people I've lost. I hear them calling to me; Ash, Mordin, Legion, Thane. It's like they're haunting me." She scrubbed at her eyes again. "I'm tired, Kaidan. I can't ever remember feeling this tired in my life, not even after Akuze, and after that hell I slept for days."

Kaidan moved to sit beside her, and pulled her into his arms. He was warm and solid, and smelled like aftershave and a hundred good memories. Vera choked on a sob as she leaned into him and let go of all the tension that had built up in her again. The tears spilled over. Not many of them, she rarely cried, but enough that she felt wetness on her cheeks and she pressed her face into the crook of his neck to hide them.

"I've got you," he whispered. "Just let go, just for now, and trust that I've got you."

She nodded and soaked in his warmth like a flower in the sun; wrapping her arms around him tightly as she let him hold her. It felt good. They'd danced around each other for so many years, always pushing down the way they'd felt about each other, but after almost losing Kaidan on Mars she had faced the truth.

She was in love with Kaidan Alenko.

Maybe she had been for years, it was hard to say, but she loved him with every fibre of her being. He made her feel like no one else could. When Cerberus woke her up she'd been prepared to go back to coldly forging ahead, to pushing people away; it was Kaidan on Horizon who got through to her and made her feel again.

It was always Kaidan who shook her world and made her feel.

And she loved him for it, dammit.

Vera clung to him all the tighter, drinking in his warmth and humanity. Loving him for all his virtues and all of his faults, and thanking whatever cosmic presence might be listening that they had found their way to each other again, and that Kaidan loved her too. In the storm of her life, he was her safe harbour; her calm waters.

"Have some coffee." Kaidan pulled away, and pressed the lid of the thermos back into her hands. "You haven't had anything except water to eat or drink in two days, and don't even try to deny it because EDI told me, and you know she watches you like a hawk."

She nodded and sipped the coffee. "Thanks."

Kaidan watched her take another mouthful and sighed, scrubbing the back of his neck as he leaned back in his chair. "I don't know about you, but Thessia got me thinking about a lot of things. Up until now I felt like the Alliance was doing okay. I mean, things were exactly easy for us, but we were winning our fights and we were making steady ground. But Kai Leng and what he did-"

He drew in a steadying breath and closed his eyes for a moment. When they opened his pupils sparkled with faint flecks of biotic blue and anger marched across his face. "I wanted to kill him, Vera. Not for stealing the Catalyst information or for killing those innocent people, but for almost getting you killed. I wanted to rip him apart because he almost took you from me again."

"Kaidan." Vera put the cup of coffee down and took his hands; they trembled in her grasp, and his biotics pulsed under his skin in time to his heartbeat.

"I almost lost you yesterday." His eyes met hers with an intensity that pulled the breath from her body. "When I saw the floor give way and you vanished, I thought you were gone. I thought I'd lost you again." He looked down at their entwined hands and wisps of blue crawled over their fingers as he flared, his emotions getting the better of him. "I was helpless to do anything to stop him, helpless to save you, and it made me realise that any day now could be our last. We don't know when the end is coming or when we're going to have to say goodbye to each other, and I don't want to live my life like that, Vera. I love you, you know that. But I don't want to let another day go by without saying the words and making sure that you know it."

She nodded, swallowing the lump in her throat as she squeezed down the memory of the horrifying moment she had thought she was doing to die. Had she not been quick enough to grab hold of the ledge and climb back up, she would have plunged to her death. She might never have seen Kaidan again; kissed his lips or held his hands as she was now.

"I love you too," Vera told him. "I'm sorry it took me so long to realise how much you mean to me."

Kaidan chuckled, his anger fading as he looked into her eyes. "You needed time to work out what you wanted, and I was happy to wait." He leaned forward and tucked the wayward lock of hair behind her ear again. "I'm just glad I got you back again, and that we got our second chance."

"Me too." She leaned forward and kissed him, trailing her fingers along his cheek. "We've had some close calls, but we made it as a couple in the end."

"We did. Hey, why don't we go and get some real coffee at Apollo's?" Kaidan suggested with a small smile. "Or I know this great little out of the way coffee shop near the Citadel Lake if you prefer something quieter. We could get take awake and sit down by the water?"

Vera nodded and wove her fingers with his. "The lake sounds good, but I'm happy with your coffee, truth be told. I like my coffee like I like my men; strong and fresh from the Normandy." She wiggled her eyebrows suggestively and Kaidan laughed.

"Aw, be still my beating heart." He kissed her again, an almost chaste press of lips, though the crackle of biotics was enough to get her heart pounding. "Drink the rest of that cup then, and we'll head down and find a spot under the trees. I think some sun and air would be good, even if it's all fake."

"Me too."

She felt calmer as they stood to leave, as though unburdening herself to Kaidan and talking about her fears and doubts had lessened the load on her shoulders. The press of people in the corridor didn't seem quite as daunting either, and though she still found the wealth of the people on the Citadel distasteful, she could see the fear in their eyes as they hurried past her, and she could see the forced smiles on their faces.

They were scared.

She had been wrong earlier; the war was here. Maybe not as obvious as it was up on the docks, but those same fingers were tightening their grip on these people too, and they were starting to panic as the war closed in.

She and Kaidan didn't speak as they made their way down to lower levels of the Citadel; walking hand in hand to the lake in a companionable silence. Kaidan occasionally swept his thumb over the back of her knuckles in an affectionate gesture, and she squeezed his fingers in return. It felt like madness to be so open with him in public, but with the reapers on their door she couldn't seem to bring herself to care about the fraternisation regs anymore.

She loved Kaidan, and more importantly, she was happy with him, and in times like these that was a rare thing. It was something worth cherishing and embracing. And besides, there were lots of other Alliance couples walking around together too; they weren't the only ones clearly flouting the regs now that the reapers had arrived.

They found a place near the lake and sat down in the shade of a tree covered with luminescent pink blossoms; Vera settling herself between Kaidan's legs and resting her back against his chest. The dappled light painted patterns over both of them, and she breathed in the perfumed scent of the flowers as she relaxed against him; feeling the gentle pulse of his biotics against hers, and lapping up the warmth of his body.

"I needed this," she said quietly as she let her eyes drift closed, resting her head in the crook of his neck. "Just to be with you like this, without worrying about reapers or Cerberus or even the Alliance."

Kaidan wrapped his arms around her waist and rubbed his cheek against hers, his stubble scratching pleasantly. "I wish I could freeze time and stay like this with you forever," he said, voicing the same thought she'd had earlier. "Just the two of us here like this."

He brushed his lips against her cheek, and then pressed smaller, lighter kisses along her jaw and down her neck. Vera smiled and wiggled pleasantly as it tickled. She turned in his arms and linked her arms around his neck, catching his mouth with hers. She teased his lips apart with small kisses, daringly flicking her tongue out to wet his lower lip, and groaning happily as he opened his mouth to her invitation and their mouths melded.

Kaidan pulled her into his lap, his hands roaming down her back and tracing her curves as their tongues swirled together. The kiss was tender, soft and sexy, and they broke apart with several smaller kisses, both of them tickling the other with miniature biotic flares. Vera chuckled as Kaidan insisted on kissing the very tip of her nose and then let her flop back on the grass, lowering himself down beside her and resting his chin on the heel of his hand.

"Did it work?" he asked.

She blinked. "Did what work?"

"Did that kiss stop time?" Kaidan clarified with a smirk.

Vera laughed and reached up to tussle his hair. "I think it might have."

"Good." He leaned down and kissed her again, one hand wandering along her body and teasingly plucking at her buttons and buckles. "I've missed that smile."

"What smile?" She felt her grin stretch wider, unable to stop the happy feelings streaking through her as he teased her.

Kaidan grinned in return, his eyes crinkling. "That smile you do just for me. That one." He touched her lips and leaned down to kiss her again. "You used to smile like that when you'd visit me on the SR1 when I was fixing that panel."

Vera rolled her eyes. "I did not!"

"Did too!" Kaidan's eyes sparkled and he leaned closer, his nose almost touching hers. "It's the same smile you gave me when you visited me in hospital too."

"You're imagining things!" She couldn't seem to stop grinning as Kaidan leaned down and kissed the tip of her nose again.

He shook his head. "Nope. That's definitely the same smile. My smile."

Vera laughed against her will. "Dammit, Alenko! Fine! Have it! It's your smile! You're such a freaking boy scout!"

"Good! And I'm proud to be a boy scout; I'm pretty sure that's part of the reason you love me." Kaidan cupped her face and gently traced her lower lip with his thumb, his voice dropping lower as he spoke. "I love you more than anything else in this world, Vera Shepard, and no matter what this war throws at you, I want you to know you're not alone. I'm with you to the end."

Her eyes prickled with embarrassing tears again, and she dashed them aside as she smiled up at him. "I'll hold you to that, you know." She kissed his thumb as it traced her lips. "And I love you too. Always."

A/N - Aaaw! ^_^ I hope you enjoyed this! Reviews are most welcome!