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wrathbites · 2 years

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I am lowkey now obsessed with vampire!Shepard/Kaidan. I never knew I needed this in my life until right now. Could I perchance throw out an idea for a fic? The first time Shepard feeds off Kaidan for some reason? Bonus points if they're together romantically by then.

INHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAALES AND SCREAMS FOR A YEAR. Ahem. 'Nonny, you have no idea how delightful it was to come across this message. It made my weekend, never mind my day. I only set out with this AU because it sparked joy for me, but hearing others say they also enjoy it? Hearing this from you? Receiving a prompt about it? I'm still on cloud nine, never intending to come back down lol

aofihuehfurwghurwg okay so onto the fic. I hope you don't mind, but this isn't a "first feeding" so much as a "first taste" (I have... several... first feeding ideas now. 9 to be exact. [I have AUs of an AU now oh god]) and they're not romantically together yet so I need to skip on those bonus points buuuuuuuut. For at least another two of those ideas I have rattling around in my skull, those points would apply. Alas, trying to wrangle them onto paper and into words is proving somewhat of a challenge XD

So uhm. With that! I hope you enjoy!

Risk the hostages now, or countless others later. Save a few, or potentially hundreds more. An impossible choice but Shepard makes it. He always makes it, he has to. So Kaidan and Vakarian follow his lead when he steps aside, and allow the batarian terrorist safe passage.

Except — the gravity well shudders under his fingertips, tortured by another with claws hooked deep. Except Shepard's mask of indifference doesn't quite cover his eyes. They burn as he catches Balak by the arm and yanks him to a stop, drawing every remaining gun to his head.

Except Shepard's grin is a vicious slash of teeth with no humour, fangs a threat when he leans in close and says, ever so softly, "are you really willing to walk away from the Batarian Scourge, Balak?"

And then all hell breaks loose.

Shepard's already bled through his undershirt by the time Kaidan's kicked free of the last of his armour, mentally cursed up a storm over the new set of bruises smarting across his back, and gone limping off to medbay in search of him. There's a fist-sized dark patch spread under his ribs, no bandages in sight, and blood coming away from Chakwas' fingers with her meticulous scrubbing. They look up when the door swishes open. Kaidan doesn't miss Shepard's eyes rolling heavenward.

"Could you excuse us for a few minutes, please, Doctor?" he asks. Her lips press into a thin line of displeasure as she dries her hands, gaze snagging on his sidearm — standard protocol, whether she likes it or not.

"Remember the rules, gentlemen — there's to be no maiming one another in my medbay," she says in a tone that'll brook no nonsense, only departing when she receives acknowledgement and agreement from them both. Kaidan engages the lock behind her, moves over to the window and tilts the blinds for privacy, finds Shepard watching him when he turns back around. Still seated, still playing the docile vampire when he'd been anything but just an hour ago.

"Why do you still bother with restraints?" Kaidan asks when it's clear silence will reign otherwise. They won't hold him, not for long, not without the assistance of a stasis field, and yet Shepard's making no effort to free himself.

Why? Why leave yourself a moment's vulnerability. Why trust me?

Shepard twitches his shoulders forward, all he can do with neck, arms, chest, waist, and legs all bound and secured. "A false sense of security is better than none at all, I've found."

"Uh-huh. Sure, that's believable, but I'm pretty sure Chakwas knows ten different ways to incapacitate you before you can so much as snap your teeth in her direction."

"One, actually."

"Shepard."

"Alenko," he parrots back with a scowl and, Christ, what Kaidan would give to knock his other fang loose. Insufferable bastard.

"Seriously, Shepard, c'mon. Are they even necessary these days? You've been a vampire how long?"

"Almost six years," Shepard's back to that staring habit of his that doesn't involve a single blink, eyes boring into Kaidan like laser sights as he approaches, gait the same as it would be if he was pacing the rest of the ship, neither slow nor cautious because he doesn't need to be either —

"And when was the last time you attacked a human?"

"About the same length of time."

— not around Shepard.

"So why?" The stare breaks when Shepard glances down, watching Kaidan pry open a buckle and loosen the strap around his left wrist, followed by the one at his forearm. No breathing, but there's a catch around an unnecessary swallow. Hm.

"They're... one of the conditions I must abide by."

Conditions. To return to active duty. Kaidan's placement as his watcher, the sidearm Kaidan can lay hands on at all times, more he's not aware of but Shepard hinted at their first day aboard. More, including restraints. Fucking hell.

"Six years handling humans like fragile glass, and they still treat you like a monster."

His other arm free.

"My species didn't exactly win humanity the First Contact war with diplomatic discussion, Alenko. The caution is warranted."

His chest next, still as the death he walked away from.

"The day caution becomes cruelty is the day it should end," Kaidan replies, taking a knee to work on the bindings around Shepard's legs. He freezes, however, when cool fingertips brush the fine hairs at the nape of his neck. It's one thing to have a vampire's hand so close to his throat, but to have them skirting his amp jack?

Kaidan's turn to swallow.

"Speaking from personal experience, Alenko?"

He looks up and Shepard's fingers ghost around, settle under his chin and tip his head up, grey eyes fixed where his pulse hammers fast.

Oh god.

"Something like that," he replies, a sandpaper rasp, mouth gone dry

"You underestimate the threat I pose to you," Shepard says next, soft as a whisper, still fixated on Kaidan's throat while freeing his own one-handed.

"Or maybe," Kaidan says, reaching for the restraints around his waist, "I listen to what others say about you, and decide I don't see what they do." The last one comes loose with a faint hiss as it slides from his hand, and just like that Shepard's free.

If Kaidan had true cause for concern around him, it'd be proven in that moment. He'd be flat on his back with teeth in his neck and hands holding him down, bones creaking in protest of a vampire's strength. He'd be struggling like a hooked fish, dark energy screaming between them, and ultimately he'd lose.

But it's not death looking back at him. It's Shepard, gaze lifting from the heartbeat he can see and Kaidan can feel, halting just as his breath does when Shepard's thumb lifts to his mouth, not quite making contact. Not yet.

"And if I tell you I'm a danger?"

A moment's vulnerability.

Oh. God.

"I'd ask if you were planning to kill me or kiss me."

The slightest pressure from Shepard's fingers and he stands, turned free when Shepard doesn't follow suit, stepping back when a jolt of ice strikes his hip in time to the blossom of blue around his sidearm, biotic field humming along his nerves. "I could ask the same of you," Shepard says.

"Conditions," he replies.

There's no flare of panic from Shepard when he removes his pistol from its holster, no flinching aside. No, he gets to his feet, stands straight, hands clasped behind his back. Watching. Waiting for his watcher's judgement.

"Caution," Kaidan continues, turning the pistol sideways and pressing it to Shepard's chest, "at its end when it becomes cruelty."

You're not a monster.

Shepard sets it aside with the same care he shows when settling a hand on Kaidan's side, over his belt. Loose, a question. Will he walk a fine line with danger, or retreat back to safety?

You never were.

He finds the blood on Shepard's undershirt, catches it in his fist and pulls him across that minuscule distance between them.

I'm not afraid of you.

Shepard's cool to the touch all over, lips, teeth, the line of his jaw, the tender skin around his own amp jack. His tongue, soothing the sting when Kaidan nicks himself on one of those fangs, his breath when he draws back, his exhale Kaidan's inhale, his moan Kaidan's secret.

I never was.

"We shouldn't —"

"Shepard, if you hit me with fraternisation regs now, I swear to god I'll knee you in the balls and see how quick you recover from that."

Laughter, tucked into his shoulder when Shepard ducks his head, Kaidan's fingers buried in his hair and free hand sliding around his back, finding the stain twin to the one on his front.

"I meant I haven't fed yet. I can't — you can't — be bleeding. Around me."

"Another one of those wonderful conditions you agreed to?"

"Mmhm. No direct feeding from a human. My own preference as well, but..."

"Go, then. I'll wait."

"You will?"

"I mean, I won't stare at you while you're uh. Feeding. That'd just be weird. And I promise I won't snicker if you stick an IV line in the bag and 'slurp it up like a slushie'."

Shepard's still laughing some ten minutes later and it's just as well he can't choke on inhaled mouthwash, else Kaidan would have some awkward explaining to do when Chakwas quizzed him on the cause of secondary death.

He catches her smile when she spies his sidearm on her desk. What she does with it after they leave medbay, back to business as usual when it's decidedly not, he never asks.

And he notices the missing cut later, when he's checking and rechecking the repairs on his armour. Smooth skin where there shouldn't be. He swipes his thumb over his lip. No dried blood to be found, no scarring, either.

No mark from Shepard's kiss except the memory.

#Wrathreplies #Wrathwrites #Rhys Shepard #Mass Effect fanfiction #kehfiuehsfuhrufherhfgiurgfhriufhufhifuwro HI THANK YOU SO MUCH #Sunlight and Stardust vampire verse

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