Life was an endless loop, a hamster running restlessly on a wheel that wouldn't stop turning. It was the same bullshit day in and day out: Shepard would go out, kill people in the name of "peace" (what a crude mockery that was), and tell herself sweet, sweet lies to make herself sleep at night. But was she really better than any of the people she shot? Was she truly a better person than they, so saintly and god-like was she; it was her given right to go around doing this? They all fought for the same reasons: to save their own hides, to live. Hell, she'd be surprised if any of them didn't think they were on the right side, fighting for all the right things—saving their homeland, protecting their families.
The hypocrisy sickened her. All of it was a cheap illusion of justice. And sometimes she could not wash their blood from her hands, their faces from her mind. But rubbing at her eyes did nothing, washing her hands could not wipe away the stains. The remorse ate away at her, made it hard to concentrate.
She was pathetic.
She was a sorry excuse for a soldier, for a savior of the universe. Shepard need not worry about such things as long as she got the job done. That was all that mattered.
Right?
It was hard to discern the truth from all the bullshit Cerberus fed her, and she honestly didn't know anymore. What was she to believe? Was she really anything more than some puppet for Cerberus to bounce around, to bend to their whims? She certainly didn't feel any different.
Her face is burning, her vision is blurry and the mirror in front of her showed back a person she didn't know. Or, at least, someone she knew once, but forgotten long ago. The memory of them is vague, and they are nothing more than a horrible imitation.
Red scars, long and curved and jagged; short black curls; dark brown eyes; mocha skin. And yet she doesn't know who stares back at her. It is impossible to tell, lately. So hard. And she is under the impression she wouldn't want to know.
Sometimes… sometimes I think it would all just be so much easier if—
"You are wanted in the debriefing room, Commander." EDI's voice intoned outside the door. The AI snapped Shepard from her thoughts. She clears her throat, wipes at her eyes.
"In a minute." Her voice was too husky, too full of an emotion that makes her feel hollow.
"Of course."
She was pathetic, surely. So cowardly was she, so goddamn weak. Shepard was no soldier. Shepard was unreliable, undependable. Why did they all follow her like this? Idolize her like some false deity? She didn't deserve it, any of it. She wanted them to stop, and so badly.