"Hey." I said, watching Commander Shepard walking over to me, wearing fancier clothes than the rest of the crew.
"Hey Dylan. I see you found the clothes." Shepard smiled.
"EDI has a sense of humor, apparently. She didn't mention that my spot down here was this top step." I sighed. "All I have to do is clean my guns and play my strat." I said, patting the old white Fender Stratocaster.
"There's always the bottom step." Shepard said.
"The mean lady tried to kill me when I started playing my guitar and singing down there." I said. "She doesn't like my music. She likes my tattoos, though."
"We probably should've told you about Jack." Shepard said, looking at the tattoos running down my arm.
"Like them? I do." I said. My tattoos were spiky and completely black, the only curl around my heart. They ran from the bottom of my neck to the end of my leg. They barely overlapped on my right side, and they didn't touch my fingers.
"How did you get an honorable discharge?" Shepard asked.
"I couldn't continue my duties. Not the ear: I lost it when I was younger, and I can hear out of it, even though it sounds like the volume of life has been turned down some." I said, and tapped my left leg.
"What happened to your leg?" Shepard asked.
I raised my left pants leg, showing off the cybernetics that began a little under my knee. "Lost it. Everything happens to my left side." I chuckled. "That's why I got the tattoo on my left side."
"What happened?" Shepard asked, sitting beside me. I began slowly playing again.
"That, ma'am, is personal." I said.
"Why don't the Cerberus files have anything on you?" Shepard asked.
"Full of questions, Commander? Maybe Cerberus didn't find me interesting, or maybe the story of a messed up kid turning into a soldier is better suited to the vids. Minus the turning into a mercenary thing." I said.
"Commander, we're approaching Horizon." Joker said.
"C'mon Dylan. You're in my squad." Shepard said.
"Wait, I need to ask you something." I said. "Why do you care so much about me?"
"You're an interesting person." Shepard smiled.
"Interesting, or crazy? Not many people like my personality." I said. "In truth, I'm not very good with people and I come off worse than I normally am and-"
"Calm down, Dylan. I want to know who you really are." Shepard said. I smiled, and stood up, my limbs popping as I stood.
"Let's suit up." I said.
We watched the Collector ship fly off. Some engineer yelled for the ship to come back, and Shepard was apologizing.
"We did all we could." Shepard said.
"It's okay, Shepard. We'll save them before the Collectors even have a chance to abduct anyone else." I said.
"Shepard? I know that name. Ain't you some big Alliance-type hero or something?" The engineer asked. This, my friends, is where the mission's decline south falls like it just turned to lead.
"Yes. A dead Alliance hero." Some soldier said, walking out. Shepard smiled, tears coming to her eyes.
"Kaidan." Shepard said. "How have you been?"
"It's been two years and you act like nothing's happened?" Kaidan said, stopping the Commander from hugging him. He said about how he loved her, about how she betrayed him by joining Cerberus and by not messaging him. I took a couple deep breaths, but when Shepard's last emotional barriers broke and she began to cry, I couldn't stand it. I lunged forward and hit Kaidan in the nose, making him tall to the ground.
"She's been dead for two years! Leave her alone!" I yelled. Kaidan was looking up stunned at me, my fist raised for another punch, but Shepard grabbed my hand before I could pound his head in.
"I've got a report to write." Kaidan said, getting up and wiping the blood off his face with the back of his hand.
"Make sure to put you got knocked the hell out by a ex-Marine." I said.
"Joker, pick us up. I've had enough of this colony." Shepard said.
"You okay?" I asked after dinner.
"Yeah." Shepard said, hiding behind a fake smile that broke my heart.
"Commander, you can talk to me." I said. "I know I'm not a normal person, but I'll try to help you any way I can."
Shepard looked like she was going to say something, but she just put her head on my chest and started crying.
"It's okay." I said, patting her on the back and stroking her hair. We sat like that for a long time, but eventually she looked up.
"Sorry, I got my makeup all over your shirt." Shepard said.
"You have nothing to be sorry about. Are you okay?" I asked.
"I'm...I'm better. Thanks." Shepard said. "Will you tell me how you lost your leg?"
"Really? Okay. We were on a mission. Two squads, one attacking from the front and one sneaking in. I was getting headshots out in front, but eventually my squad got out of view, running from batarians. I ran down, to help them, and they eventually got up the hill I was on. At the top of the hill, however, there is a very exposed point where a batarian shot under us. I was caught in the blast, my shin breaking in half. They put medi-gel on my foot, hoping I wouldn't bleed to death." I swallowed, forcing the tears and memories back. "I woke up in the sick-bay, oblivious to what had happened. I tried standing up, and fell to the ground. They had had to remove all the leg under my knee. The Alliance paid to get me back up, but I was too injured to keep working."
"I'm sorry." Shepard said, seeing the pain in my eyes.
"This is the worst part from a moral standpoint." I said. "I figure it's best I tell you this, just to get it out of the way and see if you hate me after I tell you what I did. It happened a bit before I got my cybernetic leg. They'd found the batarian squad, and my leg. One of the squad was displaying it like a damn trophy, and they easily found out he was the one who did it. They killed the rest, saving him, chained him to a chair, then wheeled me in with a pistol and shut the door. I shot him in the leg several times, exactly where I lost mine, then put a bullet between his eyes."
Shepard didn't say anything for a while, then she just squeezed my hand. "It's okay. I don't hate you."
I smiled. "The best thing that happened in physical rehab was I got to hear Sinatra for the first time."