A/N: First off, the disclaimer (which I always forget): I don't own Mass Effect. That honor belongs to Bioware.
This is, however, a story of MY Shepard (who is a Spacer/War Hero/Infiltrator and who was also not an only child). This goes into a little bit of her backstory as seen in my head.
Set at some point in ME3, but in no way would affect the story or outcome of ME3. Just a little reflection on her childhood and tragedy that had hit her fairly young. There's more to this story; it WILL get a little Shenko, it MAY get a little smutty (not sure yet), or it may not get finished at all.
Oh and this is because I couldn't stand how they used the same body motion for the male and female Shepard for when they danced (Oh what I wouldn't give for a game to come out that lets you play a female that actually MOVES like a female!). And because of all the "Shepard can't dance comments". Yeah, well what if it's not that she can't, but that she just doesn't.
New Shoes
Shepard sat alone in the cafe looking at old information—pictures, memories, vids—trying to remember a time when her family had been happy. She lingered on an image of a small woman, graceful, poised, with brilliant red hair and jade green eyes. The young woman was captured mid-arabesque, and she seemed to be floating on the tips of her toes on one foot, her arms outstretches as if she was searching for something or someone.
Shepard zoomed out from the image as she kicked back the rest of her bear, cursing the Presidium establishment for not having anything stronger. She didn't have to read the headline to know what it said; she had already done so a thousand times.
'Promising Ballerina, Marianne Shepard, found dead in auditorium.'
The article was nearly fifteen years old.
"Strange," she mumbled to herself, "that despite facing the end of life as we know it, Mari, I still can't let today pass without feeling seventeen again." She ordered another beer and scrubbed at her tired eyes.
"And to think," she laughed mirthlessly, "I missed the last two anniversaries." She gazed at the image once more before flipping to a different one: her and her sister looking nearly identical, dressed for a recital with their mother beaming from between them; she was twelve and her sister was thirteen.
"Making up for lost time, I guess." She took another swig of her beer as she flipped to the last letter she ever got from her sister. She had been complaining in it about how different it was dancing on Earth, but that she hadn't felt so physically challenged in years. She went on about her new boyfriend—a percussionist at school, who was eventually convicted of her murder. She tried to give advice on what Shepard should do after she graduated.
'Always weigh your options.' she had written. ' Don't think you have to follow anyone else's path. Find your own. Follow your own heart, and it will lead you to where you should be. Just, whatever you decide, promise me that you'll never stop dancing, Mira. Because, you are my inspiration. A song in your heart and a jeté in your step.'
She covered her eyes with a hand, trying to hold back tears that had long since been cried away. Quickly finishing her beer, she stood and strolled through the Presidium marketplace. She had broken her promise for too long. Marianne deserved better on this, the fifteenth anniversary of her death. And if Shepard was going to honor her memory, she needed a new pair of shoes.