This is a short vignette written after the newest ep, "Walk On By".

When Nikita had pivoted and stepped back towards him, when her soft, pink mouth had nipped at his lower lip and carried her flowery scent to his nose, Michael had, not for the first time in his association with his former material, been rendered speechless. His knees had locked, his Section training had thankfully kicked in, and he had watched Nikita stride out of his office. Michael's gaze had unerringly searched out her passing figure.

And when her cornflower eyes had stared up through her lashes, hesitant and yet taunting, tempting with her sensuality, Michael could only gaze back. Mute. Rocked to his very core.

Michael blinked sightlessly at his computer screen, hands resting on the split keyboard. If asked, he wouldn't be able to accurately assess how long he had been sitting there, motionless. His body was refusing to function normally after Nikita had broken that searing connection of their eyes. Michael didn't remember navigating the few feet to his desk, couldn't recall folding his lean body into his chair.

The only thing he could do was replay Nikita's parting words.

At her whispered, "Michael," upon walking through his door, he cleared his throat. Michael had seen her walking towards his office after an amusing repartee with Walter and had risen from his desk in preparation. He wouldn't be busy this time. Nikita deserved better.

"I just wanted to say thank you. That's the kindest thing you've ever done for me. Thank you."

Michael blinked at his computer screen and drew in a breath through the lips that were still tingling from her gentle kiss. Of all the actions he would have anticipated of his former material, what she had actually done had never figured into any of his thoughts.

Perhaps Nikita was making good on her suggestion that she should be less predictable. Michael hadn't known what to expect of her after the Peruze mission. When Nikita had struck him in Madeline's office...

Michael blinked again and half-heartedly typed a few lines on the keyboard, his hands stilling when Nikita's gentle smile rose behind his eyes. Almost unaware, his hand crept up to the right side of his face in memory of where Nikita had decked him. That had been no stinging slap of anger. Not for the first time, Michael had been relieved that he didn't bruise easily.

Comparatively, her strike to his cheek had been more powerful even than Operations' blows during the mission to take down Philo. Both had been under the influence of drugs, but Operations' performance had been orchestrated. Expected. It hadn't carried any lasting emotional weight. Nikita's attack had ripped his heart out from his chest. If he had been a man with less self-control, less experience with devastation, he would have vomited on Madeline's shoes for what Section's chief strategist had again made him do to that angel-faced innocent.

No, Michael hadn't known what to expect. All relations with Nikita since the Peruze mission had been...strained. Off-center. It wasn't until Operations had begun acting insane that she had even been able to talk to him without a nasty leer of rebellion nestled sullenly in her face.

Encouraged by her recent behavior, he had mentioned that he had some down time coming and that he thought they could spend the day together. Nikita had deftly rebuffed him. That rejection Michael had expected. Even knowing her refusal would be a verbal torture session worthy of Madeline, Michael had still been compelled to ask, to assess. To see what she would say...

What had changed? What had made her seek him out for help?

Nikita had not once mentioned the possibility that he owed her for the latest merry-go-round of betrayals he had subjected her to, hadn't alluded to any of the deceptions. She had just asked him for a favor, haltingly hoping he would grant it. Michael's mind had immediately begun racing, planning, configuring when Nikita had begged him to arrange a meeting with her mother. To save her mother from cancellation. One look at the dampness in her blue eyes and Michael's loyalty to Section dissolved.

If he couldn't help her discover why she had entered Section, Michael was damn sure she wasn't going to lose her mother because of Section. That, he was certain, would break her. Nikita couldn't break; she was the only thing holding him together.

If there was anything, anything he could do to make Nikita the slightest bit happy, Michael was prepared to take on the Devil, Oversight, or even Operations himself to accomplish it.

Michael's lips twitched humorlessly. The kindest thing. The kindest thing he could have done for Nikita was to never allow her to emotionally involve herself with him. That, Michael knew, would have been far kinder than anything he could do now.

His throat had clogged at her words. His heart had stuttered. For a moment, he had stopped breathing.

She had thanked him for being selfish, for finding relief in her happiness.

The kindest thing.

It hadn't been the kindest thing he had ever done for her. It had been the kindest thing he had ever done for himself.

THE END

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