The broad window provides a view of the terraces below, with all the greenery and playing kids; further off, a few high-rise buildings glisten in the sun.
A nice view… through a shatter-proof, bullet-proof window which cannot be opened. Through a one-way pane which lets me see wide and far, yet I am neither seen nor heard myself. Those kids down below have no idea that the polished panes of the government building conceal a well-guarded detention cell.
From what I can see, they are staging a space battle, with models of cruisers and frigates and geth dreadnoughts… they've got it wrong, of course.
Wrong.
The broad, unrestrained view… I am almost inclined to think of it as of a form of refined psychical torture.
I close my eyes for a moment but don't lean my head against the window: no need to give the psychologists something to chew on – as if they needed some more. Instead, I turn away and walk over the room, the exact number of steps it always takes. I sit by the console and open the last save of the galactic chess; I've already got rid of the habit to try and pull the chair closer.
All the furniture is fixed to the floor… routine safety precautions. After all, I might get cranky and try to smash someone's head with it… as if it could help.
It might help me to pass the time, though.
Sure, it's a cosy cell I have here, like small hotel room, with e-books to read, films to watch, games to play, even science to study, if I ask for a database access…
But no news, no network connection, no e-mails, no visitors.
Anderson's been here, once, and Hackett, to pass on what little info and encouragement they could, and investigators and psychologists aplenty; I've been escorted all around the building, for tests and interrogations and hearings.
Once, I was even transported elsewhere, in a heavily armoured and guarded vehicle, handcuffs and all the jazz – to an interrogation in the presence of a batarian attaché, who was flaying me alive with his eyes, and as nasty as he could get without laying a finger on me.
All in all, a loser. N7, remember? Been through worse, during the training.
Only, the training failed to include that part when you're being held by your own people.
I realize I've been staring at the chess position for quite some time, without actually seeing it.
The deranged Commander Connor Shepard.
The charges have been swaying from terrorism to insanity, back and forth.
Sometimes, I wish I were deranged: the Reapers merely a product of my deluded mind, the people safe.
I get up from the console and do my usual round of sit-ups, push-ups and whatever exercise I can come up with in the limited space, and I don't give a damn what the psychos might make of jumps over the table.
Fixed furniture does have its advantages.
Then I go have a shower: the unlimited supply of water is the one thing that really sweetens the time here.
I'd gladly swap it for the rationed army supply any second, anywhere else but here.
I put on the boxers but don't bother with the rest of the clothes. I sit in the lotus position on the bed and close my eyes, concentrating on my breath to empty my mind, as Samara taught me.
I sink into the memory of her calm voice and of the unmoving stars in the darkness of the space, and, once again, send my silent thanks to wherever she is.
One hundred and eleven days, caged and unable to do a thing.
"You are the only solid point in the universe, Commander. You are your only refuge: within yourself."
My only refuge… my only escape. From the cell, from the constant overview of the cameras, from the questions I have answered a hundred times.
From the routine of the maddeningly slowly passing time.
From despair.
When I open my eyes again, it's already dark; the countless lights of the night Vancouver reflecting in the sky. The hundred-eleventh day has passed into the night, the hundred-twelfth will dawn into the same small room, with the same view.
I do not know what scares me more: that I might break, or that I might get used to it.
Day one hundred and eleven passed.
A/N: No, I'm not abandoning DA because of Shepard. Ned's first person PoV as an accompanying piece to His Father's Son coming soon...