They were scheduled for a short stop at the Citadel. Refuelling, taking on provisions, a quick once over and then back to the hunt for Saren- a couple of hours at most. But Shepard, Shepard liked to help people. From averting potential diplomatic incidents to tracking illegal gambling software to persuading relatives out of dangerous jobs- Shepard had a way of seeking out even the most menial problems unsuited to her status, and solving them. Which was great. That dedication and passion made her, if possible, even more attractive to him- but they did have a galaxy to save and a ticking clock.
Kaidan followed her happily and attempted to hide meaningful smiles each time Shepard did something unnecessarily kind or noble, but from the way Wrex rolled his eyes at him- which was an interesting act for a Krogan- he was failing. At least Shepard hadn't noticed.
They were finally, finally on their way back to the ship when Shepard stopped and pointed across the hurried mass of people pushing through the ward.
"What is it now Shepard?" Wrex growled.
"That kid," Shepard said. Kaidan followed her gesture and soon spotted a small girl with a long blond plait and a cuddly Asari doll. "Do you think she's lost?" The child certainly seemed distressed and there was no clear parent in sight.
Before either of her squad mates had spoken, Shepard had started moving through the crowd, clearing a path with her sheer presence. Kaidan and Wrex followed dutifully, the latter mumbling something about not running a 'lost and found'.
"Hey there," Shepard said softly with a smile as she crouched down to the child's level. "Is everything okay?"
The girl buried her face in her doll and began to cry.
"Sssssh," This side of Shepard was as alien to them as any uncharted planet. Shepard was a lot of things, good and bad, but maternal? "It's okay sweetheart. Have you lost someone?" Without taking her face from the toy, the girl nodded. "Okay, my name is Jayne and I'm going to help you find them okay?" The child looked up at Shepard through tears, but seemed a little brighter.
Until she noticed Wrex. The girl gave a small shriek as she saw the gigantic, battle worn, scar covered figure before her. Most Krogan were intimidated by Wrex, so it was no surprise that a small human child was terrified of him.
"I think you're scaring her." Kaidan muttered.
"I should hope so." Wrex laughed. "I'll be back on the ship Shepard."
The Commander nodded and turned back to the girl.
"It's okay. He wasn't going to hurt you, but he's gone now. Can you tell me your name?"
The girl looked from Shepard to Kaidan and back again, assessing the risks of trusting these strangers.
"'s Louise." She mumbled.
"It's nice to meet you Louise." Shepard said warmly. "I'm Jayne and this is my friend Kaidan."
He crouched down beside Shepard. "Hello Louise," he said kindly. "Can you tell us who you've lost so that we can find them together?"
Louise, clearly a clever child, thought for a moment.
"Mummy says not to talk to strangers."
"Your Mummy is a very wise lady then," agreed Shepard. "But you can trust us. Do you see this?" Shepard pointed at the Alliance crest on her shirt.
"Daddy has a shirt like that." She nodded. "He's a soldier."
"Wow!" Shepard beamed. "Then you know that this symbol means that we help people. We're the good guys, just like your Daddy."
"I…. I've lost Mummy." The girl screwed up her eyes, about to burst into tears again.
"It's okay; we'll help you find her."
"You will?"
They both nodded and Louise smiled ever so briefly.
"Can you tell us what your Mummy looks like?" Kaidan asked.
"She has blond hair and square glasses and a blue dress with flowers on it." Louise gushed rapidly.
"Thank you Louise." Smiled Shepard. "We're going to stay here, and Kaidan is going to look around for your Mummy okay?"
He nodded at the Commander and left her trying to engage the girl in a conversation about her doll as he began to search the crowd. It was a relatively helpful description, but there were a lot of people and they weren't hanging around to be examined. After about ten minutes and two awkward misidentifications, Kaidan spotted a visibly distraught woman matching Louise's account. He fought his way over to her.
"Are you Louise's Mom?"
"Oh my God." She had noticed his uniform and feared the worst. "Is she okay? Where is she?"
"She's fine." He reassured her. "She's over by the elevators with my Commander."
The woman gave a sigh of undiluted relief and sped off to find her daughter so quickly that it was an effort to catch her up.
Shepard and Louise came back into view. The child was demonstrating her doll's features and the Commander was keeping her distracted with questions about it.
"Louise!"
"Mummy!" Louise dropped her doll and ran into her mother's arms.
"I was so worried! Are you okay?"
"I was scared… but then they came to help and I showed Jayne my doll."
Shepard walked over and returned the doll with a smile.
"Thank you so much for looking after her Commander-?"
"Shepard."
"Shepard?" Louise's mother gasped. "As in… Shepard Shepard?"
"She's a soldier like Daddy." Now that she was back with her mother, Louise was all smiles and giggles. "Kaidan too."
"Thank you," said the woman. "I mean, for helping Louise- but also, you know… everything else."
"It was no trouble," Shepard assured her. "And, I got to make a new friend."
Louise beamed at her. "Mummy, can they come for ice cream with us?"
"I'm sure they have more important things to do honey."
"Please?" the girl implored, running to hug Shepard's leg. Stunned, Shepard said nothing, but awkwardly patted Louise's head.
"Well, if…" She looked from Kaidan to Shepard apologetically. "If they're not too busy and they'd like to, then of course. But we can't expect them to drop everything just to go for ice cream."
They absolutely did not have time for this, but Kaidan knew what was coming.
"That sounds lovely." Shepard smiled.
—
Louise and her mother, Aisha, led them to the ice cream parlour that they'd been headed to before their separation. It was a quaint little place, clearly trying to replicate an Earth atmosphere, but unavoidably 'spacey' in feel. As they settled into a booth, Louise seized a menu and wasted no time in telling her two new friends exactly what they should order. Aisha smiled a little apologetically, but was clearly too relieved to have her daughter back to chastise her. Jayne was chatting to Aisha about her husband and his deployment and, since this topic bored Louise, she set about explaining her doll to Kaidan. It became apparent that her favourite feature by far was the way that, if squeezed correctly, the doll lit up, imitating the natural biotic abilities of all Asari.
"Hey Louise," he grinned as an idea occurred to him. "Watch this," Cautiously, so as not to startle her, he let a few blue sparks dance between his hands. The child's eyes tripled in size as she watched, utterly transfixed by this simple display. He let the sparks die away, but her face fell and she implored him for more. This time, he let the force run over him entirely, making his whole form glow. He was subtle, to avoid drawing attention, but it was more than enough to send Louise into frenzied applause and giggles when he let the show end. Aisha laughed with her daughter and held her close. Shepard was smiling softly at him with a strange warmth behind her eyes. Helpless in the glow of that look, Kaidan couldn't quite identify the exact meaning of her stare, but it fanned the flames of hope in his stomach and- above all, made him feel very very good.
And then it was over. The connection ceased as Louise squealed and they looked around to see a waitress bringing over their gargantuan sundaes. Kaidan waited for the fluttering sensation in his stomach to fade before digging in to his.
Louise turned to wave over her shoulder as she and her mother left, hand in hand. They waved back but soon their view was obscured by an approaching waiter who placed two coffees on the table.
"On the house, the manager's a fan." He explained with a wink.
Well if they were going to get free coffee they might as well drink it. Kaidan passed Shepard a cup and pulled his own closer.
"She was a sweet kid," Shepard smiled.
"Very," he agreed. "But how the hell she got through that sundae…"
"Well you seemed to manage just fine." She teased.
"Hey, biotic metabolism remember?"
"Yeah yeah Lieutenant."
After a brief lull, Kaidan spoke again- a little uncertain, but trying not to let it show.
"Who'd have thought that galactic badass Commander Shepard was good with kids huh?"
Shepard laughed a little. "My little sister was about her age." Her tone wasn't sad exactly, but still-
Shit.
"Crap, Shepard I'm sorry." He winced, internally punching himself.
"Don't be," she said sincerely, "It's fine really."
Another pause. Mindoir and her sisters had come up in conversation once before, but she'd not seemed keen to talk about it, and he hadn't pushed the matter.
"I can't- not now… But ask me again sometime."
Was now the time? He wasn't sure, but if it was and he missed it…
"What was her name?" he said softly, bracing for a rebuttal- but it didn't come.
"Ivy," she smiled. "She was seven."
Kaidan could practically taste his own relief.
"And your other sister?"
"Elizabeth." A faraway look had entered her eyes. "She was twenty- I was in the middle." A pause, and then- "God, I idolised Lizzie." Shepard said with a melancholy smile. "She was so strong and clever and beautiful- she had this amazing hair, all the way down to her waist, red and wavy and wild. Ivy was more like Dad- blonde, but she still had Mom's waves." She frowned a little. "It really used to bug me that my hair was straight and not like theirs'. Seems pretty ridiculous now."
This was going well. Did he dare tempt her to open up further?
"Were you very close?"
"Yeah," she sighed, neither happily nor mournfully. "Lizzie and I doted on Ivy- looked after her and whatever. Looking back, Lizzie looked after me a lot too- but of course I was convinced that I could do everything by myself."
"Sounds like you,"
Shepard laughed a little, but continued to stare across the table at the vacant side of the booth.
"It was so… so strange." She was frowning a little again and her voice was low. "We were sat under a tree in a field near the house for some reason- Lizzie was reading I think… Ivy and I were probably bugging her about something- and then our parents were running at us just… just… from nowhere telling us to run. I was so confused; I had no idea what… But I think Lizzie must have known- she picked up Ivy like she was nothing and grabbed my hand and we- we ran. Mom and Dad were behind us- Ivy kept screaming for them but Lizzie kept going… she dragged both of us into the wood that bordered the field and we all fell down behind this thicket, peeping over the top to see our parents behind us … but there were people with them- chasing them-"
Knowing what was coming, he reached out to cover her hand with his, just enough to remind her that he was there.
"-and Mom and Dad stopped and turned round to face them- and I didn't understand who these people were… there was shouting and then- then shots… That was the first time I'd ever heard a gun fired… And Mom and Dad just sort of… collapsed- they didn't scream or anything… But Ivy did." Shepard took a deep breath. "And before we realised, she was out from our hiding place and running right towards the raiders, screaming for Mom and Dad. I got up to run after her, but Lizzie pushed me down so hard that by the time I came round she had almost caught up to Ivy- more than halfway towards the gunmen. She scooped Ivy up in her arms and I think she must have known what was coming because she pressed her to her chest and turned back to put herself between Ivy and the raiders… and God the look on her face when she turned around… I'll never… I'll never be able to-"
He tightened his grip on her hand, stunned by her composure in the face of this confession. Shepard seemed to take some strength from it.
"And they took the shot. All of them, like fucking target practice… They put all that 'taking a bullet for someone' shit in vids, but of course a lot of bullets will carry on through one body, straight into another… By the time I made it to them, the raiders were already walking back towards the house. I didn't scream- not until I fell down beside them and… I remember thinking that there was just so much blood. More than I ever would have thought possible… and even then Lizzie was still holding Ivy to her. They- and Mom and Dad- they'd all been so real and so there moments before and then it was all just gone in seconds. That's when I remember screaming… I must have, because one of the raiders came back to deal with me… I guess I just assumed he was gonna shoot me like the others- but he decided to get a little more… 'creative' with me- so he took out this knife-" Shepard took a deep breath, "-this knife, and started to have some fun. I didn't fight, or struggle or… resist at all. I just lay there as he carved me up, big long gashes pretty much everywhere… and the bastard didn't even have the decency to finish me off. He just left me there to bleed out… And then, and then I don't really remember much. Alliance troops found me I guess. I woke up in a field hospital and that's how I met Anderson. He was nowhere near as decorated as he is now of course… I don't know why he took an interest in me, but he did. He made sure I got into a decent halfway-house to stay in till I was eighteen, checked in every so often… He tried to talk me out of enlisting- said I'd seen too much blood already. But what else could I do? I was supposed to be a farm girl." Shepard sighed. "Lizzie would be thirty-three now; maybe settled down with a family of her own- she always said she wanted kids… If things were fair, I'd probably have nieces and nephews now. And Ivy would be twenty- I don't even know what she'd be like- not really. She never even got the chance to figure out who she was going to be. God, she was just so fucking young… So yeah, I joined the Alliance. No parents, no sisters, no stupid little farm colony- what else was there?"
Shepard inhaled sharply, seeming to escape from the memories at last.
"Shit." She said, pinching the bridge of her nose, her eyes screwed shut and her head tilted down. "I'm sorry," she looked up at him. "I didn't mean to dump all of that on you. I don't know where it came from."
"Shepard," he started, with no real idea of what he would say next. Of course he knew about Mindoir- about what had happened there- but hearing a first-hand account from someone he lo-… cared about… was unbearable. "Shepard, I'm glad you told me." He said uselessly, hating himself for not knowing what to say. "And- Jesus… I… I'm so sorry. And I know you will have heard that a thousand times before and that it probably doesn't help at all or mean anything now- but… I really am, so so sorry."
She was staring at him now, looking so deeply into his eyes that he felt sure he'd shatter right there in front of her.
"It does help Kaidan," she said softly, mirroring his earlier action by lightly squeezing his hand. "And it means more than you know."
His turn to take a breath.
But she took her hand away to brush it absentmindedly through her hair. "I don't know what's going on with me. I never talk about that shit. In fact… I think I've only ever really spoken like that about it to Anderson until you- I mean, y'know, until now."
"Shepard I-"
"Ice cream? Seriously?"
Neither he nor Shepard had noticed Garrus' approach.
"We've got spectres to hunt, people to save, endless opportunities for heroic deeds- and you're sitting here eating ice cream?"
Shepard forced a laugh and stood. "Have you ever actually tried ice cream Garrus?"
"There's no real dextro equivalent." The Turian replied as the three of them made their way back towards the ship. "But I'm pretty sure it's not more important than galactic safety."
"Pft," said Shepard dismissively, seeming almost like her usual self again. "Aliens."
As Garrus gave the Turian equivalent of a chuckle, Shepard shot Kaidan a brief but poignant look; slight embarrassment, gratitude and… something else…