Note: Thanks for reading and reviewing. I guess it's about time I write some canon Regan Shepard. Trigger warnings for child abuse and neglect, drug use, mentions of human trafficking, violence and death involving minors, and fantastic racism. Playing slightly with the timeline for reasons of story. The title comes from the Dropkick Murphys' song 'The Warrior's Code' - Regan's personal soundtrack is very Celtic punk rock/Australian 1980s pub rock.

…

When Hope and Violence Collide

High Street in Southport managed to be both ironic and accurate in its name. Ancient prefabs were stacked in a Jenga game of rust-streaked dull grey blocks of ten or twelve, turning the ancient asphalt road into the bottom of a squalid canyon. The people here came in three types: the hopeless, which included the addicted and the abused; the hopeful, who still dared to dream; and finally the violent, who ruled over High Street with illegally modded guns and called themselves the Tenth Street Reds. Life sorted someone from High Street into their category by the age of twelve – you either learned to fight or you didn't by then and the Reds wouldn't take anyone younger.

Regan Shepard was sixteen, a three-year veteran of the Reds' security team who stood somewhere between the hopeful and the violent, and worried about today's job. Finch and Weisman were flashing credit chits in the faces of the worst red sand addicts and talking softly to them; the pattern was that they were all mothers with very young children. Given that the Reds generally didn't dabble in human trafficking and chose not to raise their own child soldiers when High Street was so effective, the change in routine troubled Regan to no end.

But she held her position on one of the prefab tenement buildings, sniper rifle ready to take out anyone from the Ninth Street Blues from Smith Street or the Seventh Street Greens from Scarborough Street, with whom they were supposed to have an alliance. Regan trusted any accord between the gangs with the same amount of trust as she did the Department of Child Safety, which was not at all, and so she watched both directions equally. Finch had been making noises about some big deal that would benefit all the Reds, and while Regan was highly sceptical, she remained silent on the matter. Getting kicked out of the gang now would be a death sentence.

Two years, she thought as she rubbed her aching hands. A block away from the thick sludgy Broadwater, the winter wind was bitterly cold and sliced through her thin prefab clothes. Two years and I can leave.

Regan was sixteen and didn't exist in the system. Short of being scooped up by DOCS and thrown into the foster care system, she couldn't get a CIN (Citizen Identity Number) until eighteen, and only then by signing up for the Alliance military forces. With her skill as a sniper, they'd snap her up and put her into the system on her terms. And if she had to go to some alien hellhole to fight more alien creatures – well, military survival rates were 75%, which was better than being in the Reds.

In her perch, Regan was the first to see the shuttle painted in gold, white and black as it flew towards High Street. Cerberus, she thought, heartbeat quickening. Little was known about the paramilitary organisation with its reputed ties to the Alliance military beyond its vehemently pro-human stance. Finch talked them up like they were the saviours of humanity, swearing he was going to join them one day but she was sceptical. She didn't much like the cockatoos, the calamari and the ribbits yet they were part of the galaxy. You dealt with them like you did stomach ache or the running shits from too much nutri-paste – endured it and got on with your life.

The shuttle landed and a curvaceous brunette in a white-and-black cat suit jumped out, hitting the ground gracefully despite her heeled boots, accompanied by a handsome older man with a little grey in his perfectly coiffed hair. Both of them looked too perfect, sculpted within an inch of their lives, and the woman glowed blue with biotics.

At their arrival, Finch nodded to Weisman, who entered one of the prefabs. When he emerged, a couple of the other Reds from the south end towards Smith Street were with him, chivvying a half-dozen toddlers with three or four babies in their arms. The reality of what was going on hit Regan suddenly – the Reds, who'd always held themselves above the Greens and Blues when it came to human trafficking, had finally entered the trade.

For a moment she was numb with shock – and then the part of her still hopeful merged with the part that knew violence since the day she'd stabbed her abusive mother with a fork and she readied her sniper rifle, peering down the scope at a man's ruggedly handsome face. That face, the uncanny blue of his artificial eyes, would haunt her until the day she died. But she knew that if she killed him, Cerberus would purge High Street with blood and bullets. So instead she aimed up a little before pulling the trigger.

"Fuck!" Finch yelled as the shot ricocheted around the tight rusty canyon of prefabs. "Regan, find that fucking-"

His words were cut off as she planted a bullet in one of the Reds, dropping her instantly. Her third bullet, last in the heat-sink, took care of the other one delivering babies to Cerberus.

"Get into the shuttle!" the woman snapped at the man in the business suit. "We're being attacked!"

"It's one sniper, Miranda," he responded loudly. "And it seems that one of your Reds has turned traitor, Finch, judging by the insignia on her jacket."

Regan popped the heat-sink and ducked behind the low parapet that concealed her from the other Reds. So much for hopes and dreams. She would die protecting children who didn't have much to look forward on High Street – and found herself not giving a shit.

Suddenly the rusty metal ladder overhead was torn from its wall with a sapphire glow as Ms. Biotic Barbie drew on her powers. "Get the children into the shuttle!" she snarled at the stunned Finch and Weisman.

Regan was too busy watching the ladder be lifted to stop them. Then her survival instincts kicked in and she rolled as it suddenly slammed down, the rusted metal disintegrating on impact. She lost her sniper rifle and therefore her only weapon – time to run.

Tearing off the cheap pleather jacket with its Reds insignia, Regan jumped off the far side of the prefab to the one below. There was an alley here that cut through to Worendo Street – still a slum but patrolled by the Blue Suns mercenary group, who indirectly sponsored the Ninth Street Blues. Territory in Southport was jealously guarded, no matter how small the thoroughfare.

"Stop!" yelled someone in a Blue Suns uniform – one of the humans. They kept the turians off-world.

Regan, of course, ignored him as the Cerberus Cheerleader found the ground entrance to the alley and looked down it at her, glowing blue as the sea and face promising death. As the sniper backed away, she stopped, put a hand to her ear and swore before turning around.

"I said stop!" A beefy man, hard-faced and dark-eyed, grabbed her by the neck.

Now she was going to get killed by a Blue Sun. How ironic.

The merc hauled her by the scruff of the neck to face him. "What the hell's going on?" he snapped.

"The Reds are selling kids to Cerberus so I shot two of them!" Regan answered hotly. "My own fucking gang doing that!"

"That's the Reds' best sniper," said a bearded, dark-skinned man from the shadows.

"Fuck, she looks fourteen," the beefy merc noted.

"Sixteen!" Regan corrected him.

"Damn, not legal to hire." The merc looked up as a couple cop cars actually dared to come this way, no doubt drawn by the Cerberus shuttle that just took off. "Bastards, the lot of them."

"Zaeed, we can't have the cops interfering in our business," the bearded man said tersely. "Let the girl go."

"Yeah, yeah, Vido." Zaeed dropped Regan like a hot rock, scarred face twisting in a smirk. "Good luck, kid. When you hit eighteen, ask for Zaeed Massani at the Blue Suns recruitment office. Never can have too many snipers in a company."

"Thanks!" Regan said before beating feet. She needed somewhere to hide until the furore died down.

…

David Anderson sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. The southern end of the Brisbane Coast was everything that the Alliance didn't want the Council races to see: squalid, crime-ridden and sometimes a literal hellhole. Some places were better than others, but Southport was fairly bad, and High Street apparently one of the worst places to be.

So when an informant for the Alliance came forward with information on the identity of the sniper who shot two Tenth Street Reds and interrupted some kind of human trafficking operation, he was mildly surprised to discover it was a gangbanger who turned on her own allies – and rather more so to realise she was barely sixteen.

"Nine out of ten prosecutors would be having her charged with two counts of attempted murder, possessing illegal firearms and resisting arrest," noted the forensic psychologist who'd just finished interviewing the scrawny, brassy-haired girl.

"But not this one?" he asked, turning around to face the slim, brown-haired woman.

"She's guilty and has admitted as much," the psychologist continued grimly.

Anderson looked sceptically over his shoulder at the stone-faced girl. He wouldn't have been called down here without a good reason. "She doesn't look it."

"She's an undiagnosed high-functioning autistic," was the psychologist's reply. "And I called you instead of the watch-house because of two reasons. The first is that she turned on them because the Reds were trafficking babies and toddlers to Cerberus – fairly high-ranking members, if the girl's description's anything to go by – and the second is that she intended to enlist when she turned eighteen."
"The Reds haven't been known for human trafficking until now," Major Gupta Patel of the ADF's Enoggera barracks added. "But their current leaders Finch and Weisman have developed pro-Cerberus leanings – a lot of the merc companies and paramilitary groups 'sponsor' these gangs to get cannon fodder. Regan's got her fair share of racism but apparently she feels that Cerberus goes too far and human trafficking is something she personally despises."

"What's your point, Major?" Anderson asked, folding his arms.

"There's a decent kid beneath that surly façade, a decent kid with latent biotic abilities, the skill of a professional sniper and the drive to be better than what she is." Gupta pointed his square chin in the girl's direction. "There's a born soldier in there."

"Aside from kicking the hell out of a plainclothes detective, Regan's cooperated with the police," the psychologist agreed. "Hell, she's blown open most of the gang activity in Southport just by what she's told us."

"It could be an attempt to plea-bargain," Anderson pointed out, though he was intrigued.

"Except we haven't offered one. She fully expects jail."

Anderson ah'ed softly. "Let me make some phone calls," he finally said noncommittally.

…

The door to the interview room opened, revealing a tall, black man with greying hair in an Alliance officer's uniform and an Indian man in standard Alliance BDUs. Regan sat up suddenly, tugging on her wrinkled prefab top.

The officer tossed her a protein bar and she caught it, unwrapping the pink wrapper (to show it was strawberry-flavoured) and gnawing on it after a nod of thanks. She was starving all the time these days and it wasn't just because of her growing – she should be done with that by now.

"Someone actually likes those," the Indian muttered under his breath.

"You ever been hungry?" the officer asked acerbically.

"Often."

"Regan… What's your surname?" The officer looked her up and down assessingly.

"Umm, don't have one," she replied once she'd finished eating.

"Dammit." The black man sighed and scrubbed the back of his buzz-cut head. "I'm Captain David Anderson and this is Major Gupta Patel. We're here to talk to you before a decision's reached."

Regan's palms began to sweat. "What about?" she asked warily.

"Major Patel runs Enoggera, our training barracks in this part of the world," Captain Anderson said, taking a seat across from her. "He believes there's a good soldier beneath the gangbanger – and given that every person he's picked out has wound up in the Interplanetary Combatives Academy and received an N designation, I consider him to be a good judge of character."

Regan wiped her hands on her pants. "I wanted to join the military, get myself a CIN, sir."

"I know." Anderson's brown eyes were stern and assessing. "You shot two people, evaded pursuit and violently resisted arrest."

"I thought that cop was one on the Reds' payroll," she muttered. "They've got a few 'round here."

"We know." It was Major Patel who spoke. "It doesn't change the fact you have committed violent crimes – and they're the ones we know about."

Anderson leaned forward in his seat, pinning Regan in hers with a hard gaze. "I want you to spill everything you've done and why."

How could she tell him that it was join the security team or follow paths that no one should be forced down? Anderson looked like a man who had plenty of choices, a man who'd grown up never knowing homelessness or hunger or…

"Well, my mum hit me one too many times when I was twelve so I stabbed her hand with a fork," she began and talked until her throat was dry. The Major got her some water at one point as Anderson made her go over everything, which she downed gratefully. By the time she was finished, she felt like she'd been wrung dry and flattened by a steamroller.

When it was over, Anderson sat back with a sigh. "Self-defence or defence of someone else. We've recruited people for worse."

"So… what happens now?" Regan asked warily.

"The Alliance military has a… I guess you could call it 'cadets programme' but it's for non-violent juvenile criminals," Anderson responded, rubbing the back of his head. "Normally, I wouldn't think of putting a gangbanger in that programme, but the fact you've been honest with us and don't seem to be trigger-happy compels me to give you a chance."

"You'll be under a two-year suspended sentence with a minimum mandatory enlistment of six years from the age of eighteen," Major Patel added calmly. "One of our foster carers has agreed to take you on and you will be dealing with a parole officer too."

Regan blinked. "So what does this mean?"

"It means that you have two years to get a high school diploma and prove yourself trustworthy enough to serve in the Alliance," Anderson immediately replied. "You will be under supervised release into the public. One citation for littering and you will be thrown into the stockade."

Given that Regan was expecting a juvenile correctional centre, she was stunned by this news. "You bet your arse I'll avoid trouble," she said fervently.

Patel smiled thinly. "You seem like a smart girl," he noted.

"Your foster carer is a former N3 herself – Matilda Shepard," Anderson continued. "Because you've apparently provided enough information to stop the Tenth Street Reds' activities in red sand and human trafficking, you're also going under the witness protection programme. That means you're off to Sydney."

Regan pursed her lips, mentally applauding the Captain. Sending her to Sydney would remove her from all her contacts, haunts and any potential trouble. But she remained silent about that.

"I'll take it," she said aloud.

Now it was Anderson who smiled thinly. "I thought you would."