AN: Hey, you know that 'M' rating? Yeah, this warrants it. Read at your own peril.
The Child of Fire
Starlight bathed the man and the woman beside him in a soft, pale light that seemed only to further define the darkness they lay in. Shadows crept along their faces with every errant movement, every caress and every quiet whisper.
In the wake of their success, drunk off the euphoria of survival, they'd retreated to one of the few places they would ever come to call home for a private celebration of their own. Not even bothering to tend to their wounds before they attacked each other with their passion, hastily undressing each other with little abandon to where each garment ended up. As the crew of the Normandy began their celebrations in earnest with loud jubilations and good cheer, the two of them were already deep in a world of their own, making love with a passion they normally seemed to reserve for combat. And, when fatigue and wear finally forced them to rest, they pressed in close together, each of them savouring the feel of the other, and stared upwards into the stars.
There wouldn't be much time for such rendezvous in the time to come, they knew, but for now they were content to forget such details as they enjoyed the thrill of victory and the simple presence of the other.
The woman shifted in his embrace, rolling onto her side so she could look at the man beside her.
"Shepard." She whispered quietly, smiling slightly at the sound of his name. It woke all kinds of unfamiliar feelings in her, and though some of them frightened and confused her, most of them she was prepared to enjoy.
Blue eyes opened slowly, narrowed on her in the dim light as they focussed on her. Then they filled with slow happiness as a smile appeared on his face.
"Yes?" He asked, pulling her closer to him.
She smiled in return at his display of affection, and for a moment she was content to enjoy the feeling of being loved.
"You know so much about me," She said slowly, barely above a whisper as if afraid to ruin the moment by giving voice to the thought that taken root in her mind. "And I know hardly anything about you."
The man regarded her slowly, as if suddenly unsure of himself.
"What do you want to know?" He asked carefully, though not unkindly.
The woman realized that he might not be used to talking about himself, might not even particularly like to. She had heard some of the stories about him, heard about the things he had done before embarking on the quest that threatened to claim them all. But she had heard very little about the person he had been before he had begun his meteoric rise to becoming one of the galaxy's greatest heroes. And, if she allowed herself to be honest with herself, she actually knew very little about him at all beyond the fact that he loved her.
Until now, that had sufficed. There really hadn't been time for much more than that as they went about saving the galaxy.
But now, they had time for themselves. A little, at least.
"Tell me about your homeworld, Shepard." She asked, pleaded. She wanted to know him as well as he seemed to know her, needed to understand what made him the man he was.
The man closed his eyes for a moment and sighed, for a moment sounding more tired than he actually was.
"You really want to know?" He asked slowly, almost hesitant to bring it up again.
"Yes." She answered, trying to sound firm. "Tell me about Mindoir."
For a long time, Shepard was quiet. For a moment, she thought that maybe he would refuse, would be angry at her for making him remember.
But then he sighed again, and began to recount his tale.
"Alright then, but try not to interrupt. This may take a while."
Mindoir is green. Not from orbit, as the planet is surface is actually mostly water, like Earth. But on the surface, where we lived, the land was a vibrant play on green that seems to stretch out in all directions. From the bright green of grass, the sullen jade of coniferous trees and the gleaming emerald of wide-leafed, towering trees that were alien to humanity before we settled the planet. For want of a better name we called them Giants, and since it was both accurate and simple, it struck.
In a clearing surrounded by these shades of green we made our home, intent on making this world our own.
My mother and father, a xenobiologist and a retired soldier, had fled the sprawl of Earth with the intent of raising a family of their own in the isolated calm that a colony world would provide, giving their children a chance at peace that they never had. I had been born just prior to the First Contact War, and when my father came back the two of them made their decision. We spent a few days readying ourselves, selling most of the possessions we knew we would have little use for and packing the rest away in sturdy boxes that would be arrive before we did at a prefabricated housing cubicle. My father's connections in the Alliance ensured that we would arrive at a safe planet, one that saw little of the harsh galaxy outside.
I was too young to remember much of Earth, and what little I did was soon replaced by the wonder of discovering a whole new planet to explore. I did not remember the deafening sprawl, or the sea of resentful hatred from the less fortunate. What I remember, for the most part, is waking up one day and finding myself amidst a sea of green, churned by sweet winds and shined on by a kind sun.
Maybe my recollection runs a bit halcyon, a bit sweeter than the reality of the matter, but that is what I remember best. I loved my new home with a fierceness that only a child can foster.
Not long after we arrived, I ceased to be an only child. A sister, Vanessa Shepard, full of gurgling happiness and endless curiosity, would come to join me in my adventurous travels of that place, at first in short excursions to the outskirts of the dense forests so as not to frighten her, and then deeper, past the many trickling creeks and silent dells into the secret places that only we would know.
Of course, eventually we would be forced to attend lessons, learning the history of our people and the dull, dreary sciences that we had little interest for in comparison to the spanning freedom of forests. As we grew older our trips would grow infrequent as we realized the importance of what we were being taught, and reluctantly applied ourselves to it.
But so long as the green surrounded us, we had little care.
She was perhaps the brighter of the two of us, learning the names of distant stars and peoples with an alacrity that simply couldn't match, and a thirst for knowledge that left me more than a little jealous. She would always know the names of all the trees of the forest, both in latin and in common, and able to give a name to every bird-call.
Our parents despaired of us, their early attempts to stop us from wandering out into the unknown only serving to urge us further with renewed vigour. After all, the forbidden is all, the more enticing to a child. And so it was that when I turned ten I received a compass from my mother and a series of satellite maps from my father. (Along with, and he was quick to force me to promise to never tell my mother, a knife and a small pistol along with instructions on their use.) My sister, when she reached the same age, also received these instruments.
We would split our times outside carefully, both of us careful to cover as much ground as possible while at the same time marking places of particular interest for the other to venture out to. Whether it be a breeding ground for some indigenous species or a rise in the land that gave a greater view of the surroundings or even a peculiar natural formation, we were intent to discover it all for each other.
And then one day, I turned sixteen. It was not something I planned on, not something that I was entirely prepared for. Suddenly people were curious in what I would do in life, the kind of man I would grow into. For a time I wondered if I should become a xenobiologist like my mother, working to improve the everyday life of our colony with small changes to ourselves or our environment. And then I would wonder if I should perhaps go offworld to find some new place to discover, some new world to tell my sister of. Other days I would simply lay in dread of what to come, my indecision giving birth to fear as I tried to distract myself.
On one such day, my sister came to me. She told me of a place I had to see for myself, a place she had discovered as I drowned myself in worry. I remember her telling me that we would go tonight, and any protest I made was silenced by her insistence. Not entirely willing to resist, eventually I agreed.
We made a strange sight as we sneaked out of our home just after dinner, neglecting our schoolwork. Strange, but also amusing: a sixteen year old boy dragged along by his twelve year old sister despite his quiet protests. But it was one that had been repeated many times before over the years, and by now most of our neighbours and friends recognized it as a sign that we would be conspicuously absent for some time. Whether it be days or hours would remain to be seen, but always we would return.
I almost wished I hadn't, instead remaining in the forest until it claimed me as its own.
My sister and I set out early in the evening, just as the sun was nearing the distant horizon and beginning to paint the clouds a soft gold. We trekked for hours, hiking through rough terrain with the practised ease of those who have long since learned to adapt their stride to their surroundings. Finally, as night fell on us and we were forced to bring out lanterns to light our way, my sister happily bounded away from me, forcing me to keeping with her break-neck speed even as I called out to her to slow down, fearing that she might fall and hurt herself.
Without warning I burst out into a clearing, the grass around me suddenly reaching up to my knees as it grew wild in the open space and vied for light. The stars shed their soft light down on me, with only a few clouds to shroud them from me and little light from the colony we had left to obscure their luminescence. But I, of course, was distracted by other things.
Years before, some thoughtless soul had brought with their belongings the eggs of some ailing creature of earth. Eggs that would give birth to the first generation of feral fireflies, their numbers multiplying quickly in the alien environment. Our mother had almost despaired of it all, fearing that the insects would cause terrible destruction on her adopted world. Thankfully, the poisons that made the bug so unappealing to most Earth predators seemed to be something of a favourite amongst the local birds of Mindoir, and it wasn't long before the burgeoning numbers of the bug were kept in check by the local animal-life. Crises averted, and the diversity of the planet became just a little bit greater.
My sister, it seemed, had happened across a breeding ground for the bugs.
Bright green floated around and below me, a playful dance of light that I couldn't help but marvel at. My sister was already running through the tall grass, her haphazard course upsetting the bugs enough to take flight behind her. I could only echo her laughter as she forced the insects to flight and delighting in the beautiful display it resulted in.
"C'mon John!" She caroused in a sing-song voice, waving at me to join her.
I hardly needed any more encouragement from her to join in on the fun, as simple as it was. There is something to being able to set aside your worries, if only for a time, in a brief moment careless joy.
After I don't know how long, we fell backwards into the grass in a laughing mess, and my troubles were forgotten. I was grateful to my sister for dragging my out here despite my meagre protestations, glad that she had shared this place with me.
"Look!" My sister suddenly cried out, pointing up at the sky. "A meteor shower!"
Maybe you've had the tale of an orbital bombardment recounted to you before, heard of the terror as the ground around bursts into fire and earth and all around them.
But very few people will tell you that just before that, just as they breach the atmosphere and fall toward the ground with deadly force, they are very pretty to watch. As my sister said, they look like a meteor shower, many streaks of light slashing across the sky in fiery splendour. But where a falling star would wink out of existence, the spectacle we witnessed simply kept falling, the weak shine of fire growing stronger, more radiant with each passing second.
Maybe you would wonder why pirates looking for slaves would want to lower their chances of finding prey by bombarding us. I couldn't say for sure, but I have an idea. Resistance is always tricky to gauge, especially for a race of relative newcomers like humanity was. We'd beaten the Turians out of Shanxi, and our presence was a strong if seldom seen one on the Citadel. Maybe they simply feared that we would put up more of a fight than they had the stomach for, and decided to shell us to snuff out any kind of fight before they landed. No point in taking unnecessary risks, really.
Whatever the reasons, the colony had little warning before the bombardment happened, and my sister and I had none. To us, it was simply something pretty to look at.
"Look at it!" My sister laughed, sitting up.
By then the 'meteors' had pierced through the higher levels of the atmosphere, and were even now blazing the across the sky in a light the ceased to be pure but a cruel and pitiless red. The fire of their fall dyed the clouds red as they punched through them.
My mouth hung low in wonder at the sight, not knowing the full importance of what I was witnessing. I had never watched many holovids or movies, instead using my time outdoors. My father never told me of the things he had seen during the brief war against the Turians, and I had never asked.
But when I saw one streak of fire seem to break away from the others, one that seemed to fall towards us, something inside of me warning before my conscious mind knew what was going on. Whatever it was, the last thing I remember before darkness claimed me was diving at my sister, intent on pulling her to the safety of the forest.
And then, I knew nothing.
I don't know how long I lay there, unconscious, before I awoke. My left arm hung limply at my side, dislocated from the blast as I was thrown violently aside. Pained lanced through my body from joint and every bone while my skin, blistered with heat in places, screamed out to me to lay down and rest, to succumb to weakness and let my body heal. I was about to submit, but then I remembered my sister.
I forced my agonized body to its feet, fought against the nausea that welled up in me as pain sought to overwhelm my senses. I studiously ignored the loosely hanging limb that resisted all efforts to move it even as every movement caused me to wince and hiss.
Luckily the impact had been strong enough to snuff most fire before it had a chance to take hold, and what little remained blazed fitfully in isolated patches. In place of the luminescent green of fireflies from before there were now the malevolent red of cinders wafting through the air as the cool night air warmed slightly and brought with it wind.
"'Nessa!" I called out weakly, my voice scratching painfully as I tried to force the words out. I dared not try to enunciate further, lest I only bring myself further pain. "'Nessa!"
I can't say how long I hobbled across the devastated landscape, calling out to the silence for my sister. But eventually movement caught my eye, and I staggered towards it full of hope.
I shouldn't have. I really shouldn't have.
My sister, by whatever errant shrug of fortune, had suffered the worst of the blast. Where I had been thrown away by the force of the impact she had been ripped apart by shrapnel. Maybe it was because she had tried to rise to get a better look instead of laying low as I had, but whatever the reason she was the first victim I would see of what would come to be known as the Mindoir Raid.
I lost all strength as I saw her mangled form, my knees bending below me even as I let out a strangled cry of grief. As my sister tried to reach out to me with the last of her strength in terrified agony, her face a mess of blood and charred flesh, I would like to say that I grasped her hand and comforted her in her last moments. That I was able to give her some kind of peace before she left this world.
But I retched and sobbed, the horror of what I was seeing overtaking any rational sense in my mind. She died alone as I crumpled to the ground in my own filth, crying. I don't want to think of what she might have gone through, laying there, alone. So I won't.
Sleep crept up on me, paralyzing me where I lay as the sun crept back up from where it slumbered. The sky was ablaze with colour even as in other places the forest was alight with the flames that the Batarian pirates had wrought on our quiet world. I awoke to the feeling of something crawling across by face, its many legs tickling my sensitive skin. With an errant pawing of my good hand I shooed it away, though the motion jarred me awake with a cry of pain as my fingers brushed against my skin.
I couldn't have known that I wasn't wholly unharmed by the shrapnel of the blast, that a piece of stone had opened my face up, carving a gash along my cheek towards my nose. My whole face was a mess of pain, and the sting of the congealed blood breaking free under my careless brush only reminded me of this fact.
Instead, I groaned and came to my knees. For a moment I held onto the desperate hope that it was all a terrible dream, that I would wake up and find this terrible world replaced by old fears of the future. I held out the hope that my mother would chide me for sleeping in on a school day even as my sister teased me for being a lazy-bones.
But my sister was dead, lying on the ground in front of me. My eyes narrowed on her, and for a moment I felt nothing. I was numb, incomprehension welling up inside me. Who was this person? Where was I? Why was this happening?
It didn't last, as much as I wanted it to. I quickly remembered, and with that remembrance came new sorrow and anguish. I tried to retch again, though there nothing inside of me to spill forth. So instead I simply gagged painfully as I cried once more, eventually collapsing again to the ground.
This time I did not sleep, though. This time, after I shed all the tears my body would allow me and that feeling of numbness returned, I fled. I ran back the way I had come, in a daze, trying to make my way home in a haze of grief and madness.
I must have looked terrifying, covered in ash and blood and wounds, sporting a limp arm and a hobble. I'm amazed that none of the more opportunistic animals of the forest did not seize upon the chance for an easy kill, but maybe they had been scared away by the impacts and the fires. Maybe I was simply lucky. Maybe, as everyone seems so fond of saying, I wasn't meant to die there. Whatever the reason, I eventually found my way back home, to the colony.
I couldn't have known that I had lain out in that ruined field for almost a day, that most of the raiders had come and gone in that time. What I did know was that the streets were silent save for the crackle of fire and the scream of wind through broken windows.
I limped through those empty paths, calling out the names of anyone I could think of. Mother. Father. My teachers. My friends. Silence echoed back at me, taunting me with my own desperate hopes. Without quite knowing I found myself making my way home, trying to find some kind of normalcy in the midst of all the carnage.
But my path was blocked. As I rounded a corner of our narrow streets, I saw that a ship had landed right my path.
There were a pair of figures standing there, their backs to me. I recognized their tall heads and grey skin as that of Batarian, a creature I had only seen before in textbooks and holos. A quiet voice, one that had listened carefully in class and taken notes, whispered to me that they were notorious as pirates and slavers.
To this day I cannot fully explain why I did what I did then.
Maybe the pain had driven me mad. Maybe I had simply lost all hope with the death of my sister. Maybe I was hoping that, beyond all probability, these Batarians were here to help. Maybe I was ready for it all to simply end, whether it be in the chains of slavers or in a pool of my own blood.
But for whatever reason I hobbled towards them with determination, for the first time not feeling the pain that wracked my form. I called out to them, wordlessly, trying to gather their attention.
They turned to me, and I was sure I heard one of them chuckle darkly before saying something I couldn't understand. They approached me, confident in their abilities to take control of a lone, crippled boy.
As the first one reached out for me my hand good hand snatched my father's knife from its sheath at my side. I brought it up and out with a speed that I would later regret as many wounds reopened themselves along my sides with the movement. The alien had time for a brief cry of surprise before I jammed it into his neck, savouring the sound of his pain even as I let go of the handle of the blade and snapped back down for the small pistol. His partner, surprised by my sudden resistance, brought his gun to bear on me even as a sudden weakness caused to fall to my side. He shot at where I had been, while I pulled the trigger in his general direction.
Again and again, not even trying to aim. A desperate hatred guided my will, not the calm of rationality.
One of the shots must have caught him, as he staggered away from me clutching his chest while I fell to the ground, landing painfully against my dislocated arm. With renewed fury I let loose against him, emptying my weapon in a desperate attempt to kill the beasts that had taken so much away from me. Eventually its head snapped to the side, a spray of blood arcing out behind even as he fell backwards in a boneless heap.
For a moment I simply lay there, breathing quickly and deeply as adrenalin pumped through my veins. It helped against the pain, helped to block out what I had done. I'd killed them, let them get close so I could do it.
I was surprised when I felt not horror, but satisfaction at what I'd done. They killed or stole away everyone I'd ever known, and I'd lashed back out at them and survived. Maybe that was what allowed me to continue on my way, thoughtless in the inordinate pride I felt for the deaths I'd caused.
I should have considered that my reckless attack would have summoned the attention of other raiders. I should have run and hid before any of them could spot me. I should have taken their weapons to replace the one I'd just emptied of ammo. I should have done a lot of things.
But I didn't, just crawled under their ship on my way back home. I would take a shower, maybe sleep in my bed, and wake to find that everything was back to normal.
As I emerged on the other side I heard the sound of footsteps on the other side of the ship along with rapid conversation. Fear welled up in me once more, and in my terror I tried to run. I did not get far before my aching limbs rebelled against me and I fell forward to ground with a grunt of pain.
They must have heard me, because a moment later I was rolled onto my back. My eyes fought to focus against the sudden brightness of the clear sky above, seeing only the vague outlines of the forms above me. Dark faces spoke at me, but their voices were far away and incomprehensible to my frail mind. Weakly, I brought my hand and the pistol upwards at them, pulling down on the trigger even though there was nothing left to fire.
Gentle hands pushed my hand back down, and one of the faces leaned closer. I saw two eyes, not four. A nose and ears, hair. Human.
I cried in relief, thinking that I had at last found a survivor of the attack, someone I could rely on.
Lieutenant Zabeleta of the SSV Einstein listened to my babbled relief patiently, his own fears somewhat allayed upon seeing a survivor of the grisly scene he and the others of the ground team had witnessed. After a while of fruitlessly asking them if anyone else had made it darkness seized me once more, casting me into a deep, dreamless sleep.
I awoke on the Einstein, an IV hooked to my arm and body swathed in gauze. I was alone. My sister was dead, my parents were gone. Everyone I'd ever known, gone in an instant.
When I recovered from my wounds, I realized I no longer had any fear for my future. I knew what I would do.
I would make sure that Mindoir never happened, ever again.
She listened as Shepard related the tale of his ruined home, of the people he would never see again, and felt that she did indeed know him a little better. She could understand now why he was such an immovable force, why he had such a strong will.
As he drew to a close she held him tighter, wishing for a moment that she hadn't asked him to relive that. She had known that something like that had happened, but it was one thing to know about something and another to be told about it from the person who had lived it firsthand.
"Thank you." She whispered, and she was grateful.
He was silent, not looking at her. For a moment she was worried that he would ask her to leave, would hate her for what she had asked of him.
But then he rolled over and held her close, pressing his face against her shoulder. She was surprised at this for only a moment before she recovered, stroking his back as she felt wetness against her neck and shoulder even as quiet gasps.
When they woke in the morning, he would again be Commander John Shepard, one of the most powerful people in the galaxy.
But for now, he mourned the boy who lost everything in a brief flash of fire.
AN: Yeah, this story is a one-shot. I've always wanted to do one. If response to this story is good, I may follow up with a second one about Shepard's background (The Skyllian Blitz). In any case, I hope you enjoyed reading this. If you did, lemme know! If you didn't, I'd greatly appreciate you letting me know what you didn't like so I can take that into consideration for future works.
Also, I totally made it in one day. Go me!
I was deliberately careful to omit who 'the woman' so that everyone could enjoy it. (well, everyone 'cept slash/yaoi fans. Sorry guys, totally didn't think of that 'till I was nearly done. And I am nothing if not lazy.) Even though I am a dirty, dirty Talimancer, and I quirk an eyebrow at anybody who honestly thinks Miranda is a more interesting character than the other options. But that might just be me, so please don't assault me in a dark alleyway. Besides, it's not as if it's the focus of the story. My only regret is that Jack would be more than little OOC in the role, but meh. Maybe she was really softened up by the end of the game.
Take it easy peoples!