Quintessential Hero
Disclaimer: I own nothing... except the author's crazy imagination!
Summary:Post ME3, and starts during The Avengers movie. Thanks to a certain omnipotent being with a penchant for mind games, Samantha Shepard finds herself in a strange new world.
Author's Notes: I hope you all enjoyed the previous chapter, and this one as well! I find it's a little harder for me to write highly dramatic scenes, as I really prefer more humorous situations. Well you'll just have to read and review, and tell me how I did! Also, I think Micheal Shepard deserves a theme of his own. Running Up That Hill by Placebo, it suits him rather well. Shot In The Dark by Within Temptation, is Samantha's theme. (I've placed links for each Shepard's theme in my profile!) Lastly, I like to say thank you to all of my readers and reviewers, I'm glad so many people have found and enjoyed this story!
Samantha Shepard: *Runs up to the author and tackles/bear-hugs him, knocking said author to the ground*
Archer83: Oh God! This is it... what did I do to piss you off Samantha? Please... just make it quick! *Author slams his eyes shut and waits for the inevitable*
Samantha Shepard: Well... since you asked nicely... *Shepard plants a kiss on the authors cheek and lets him up* Thank you for giving me a second chance with Micheal, Archer.
Archer83: Huh... *As the author blushes profusely* ...Oh, ah sure thing Sam...
Chapter 14
'No... I can't bear to see this... not again...', Samantha thought, as she took in the smoking ruins around her that had once, so long ago, been her home. She felt a hot tear run down her cheek, she knew what was coming, this was far from the first time she had had this dream.
Samantha watched, utterly transfixed, as the young, innocent, fiery-haired girl, ran past her looking for any place to hide, any way out of this hell. Before the fifteen year old got much farther, two adult male batarians had caught up to her, and viciously tackled her to the ground. As she kicked and screamed for them to let her go the batarians just laughed.
A helpless Samantha scowled at them, while she watched from a short distance away.
"You think we have time for a little extra fun with this one Xurral?", the man's partner just grinned and said, "We can spare a few minutes... I like the feisty ones."
A sad grin formed on Samantha's lips as she saw a young man, armed only with a knife and his fists, run at one of the batarian's, jumping at the last second, and drop-kicking the man as hard as possible.
'If only he hadn't chosen to be the big damn hero... that needed to save a naive and stupid little sister who had gotten herself caught so easily..." , Samantha thought, even as the profound pride at her brother's brave actions shone in her eyes.
Taken by surprise, the second batarian was stunned to see this eighteen year old human barreling at him, his knife glinting in the sunlight, with murder in his eyes. A split second later, a blade was buried deep into the batarian's throat through the open front section of his helmet.
The boy raced to his sister helping her up, and they both started to dart away as fast as their terrified feet could carry them.
Samantha couldn't help wincing as a pistol round tore into the brother's shoulder and he stumbled in intense pain.
As he fell to the ground, his sister desperately trying to help him back up, he told her, "Sammy please... get the hell out of here! NOW!"
Tears streaming down her face, his sister started sobbing, and quickly whispered, "I love you!", in his ear. Then she dashed away at break neck speed, not stopping until she was kneeling, just over the top of a small hill, roughly one hundred meters from him.
Samantha could feel the tears starting to flow over her own cheeks, as the horrible event unfolded, yet again, right in front of her.
"YOU! Human, call that bitch sister of yours back here now, or I swear I'll end your worthless life!", the batarian who had been drop-kicked, yelled at the boy. The man motioned with his pistol for the boy to get up off the ground. He slowly nodded, and got to his feet.
Yelling in the general direction in which she had run, her brother said,"Samantha... I need you to do something for me!...", and then Micheal, shouting at the top of his lungs bellowed, "RUN SAMMY! RUN AS FAST AS-"
BANG.
Samantha jolted awake, the crack of a distant gun shot still ringing in her ears. Words couldn't describe the sense of relief she felt in that moment, as she looked over and saw Micheal, peacefully sleeping next to her on the infirmary bed.
She leaned closer, and softly whispering in his ear, said, "I've missed you so badly Mikey... I'm never leaving you again.", as she laid her head on his chest. A short while later she was lulled into a peaceful, dreamless, sleep by the steady beat of his heart.
Ah yes, "Page Breaks", A literary device used to show the passage of time. We have dismissed that claim.
Five Days Later...
The five of them were at the table in Tony's kitchen, sitting down to eat. Tony was grudgingly Pulled from his lab for a few minutes, literally by bioticly glowing Samantha, a slight blue aura surrounding him as well, with his arms crossed and his feet dragging along the floor like a stubborn child.
As Tony slumped down in a chair and Samantha told him, "Now stay put dammit! Escape is impossible...", Micheal Shepard found himself gazing around the table at the three men that his sister seemed to consider very close friends.
They certainly were a unique group of people, to say the least. Samantha had talked them into, as she called it, a 'Welcome Back!' dinner for him. Well, maybe not talked into, as much a dragged kicking and screaming in Tony's case. He had been released into their custody, he was logically guessing, earlier that day. 'Their' being, Tony, Steve, and Bruce.
Apparently the two SHIELD agents in the group, Clint and Natasha, had been given an urgent assignment three days after he woke up. After only two days had passed Samantha, he noticed, already seemed worried about them. She had explained to him that the SHIELD agents were actually very much like an earlier version of the Spectres.
She also had told him that Thor, a supposed Demi-god from another realm called Asgard, would, she hoped, return to see them soon. To say that Micheal was confused by this interesting bit of news was an understatement.
Just before he had been allowed to leave the Helicarrier with them, he had received a stern warning from a rather serious man with a eye-patch, who had told him, "I've had about as much odd shit happening around here as I can take lately, but I trust your sister and the judgment of her associates. You do one thing to make me change my mind and your ass is getting locked up in the deepest, darkest, hole I can find. We understand each other?"
Micheal had been sorely tempted to tell the man, who was obviously in charge of this 'SHIELD' organization, exactly what he thought of him, but Samantha had grabbed into his arm tightly, saying, "Of course he understands Director Fury... don't you Micheal?"
"Perfectly", had been his terse reply.
'Well, this is either the longest, weirdest, and most wonderful dream I've ever had or... maybe this IS actually happening.' A still very much confused Micheal Shepard mused to himself, as the last few days drifted through his mind.
The first day had been the toughest for him to get through.
When the truth had hit him like a biotic Slam, literally and metaphorically, Micheal had broken down at the sight of his long dead little sister and told her the horrible truth about what he had done, not being able to stop himself.
He thought for sure that she would only see in him the monster Micheal had always felt, deep down, that he was. When he woke up, with Samantha still laying next to him, her head on his chest, and gently holding him, he had never felt more grateful to anyone in his life.
They had been left alone most of that first day, talking, reminiscing over their vastly different memories, and joking. They both just simply enjoyed being with each other again, because of this wondrous blessing fate had gifted to them, or apparently because of some, very annoying, entity called 'Q'. Oh, and the little thing about this being a different dimension/universe and time.
Micheal was still trying to wrap his head around everything that had happened, but he really didn't care about the 'how' of it all. He had the one thing he needed most, family.
Samantha didn't say anything about it, but she thought it was odd that Micheal talked so little of the SR-2 Normandy and their, apparently very similar, damn fine crew mates, but she didn't feel the need to push him.
She mentally shuddered as she thought, 'What isn't he telling me... it must be even worse than our shared experience of the first Normandy's destruction...' Stories of Joker, Tali, Garrus and the rest of those she felt were her greatest friends, could wait. She found herself hoping, just as fervently as she had for her own crew, that they were somewhere safe.
On the second day after he woke up, the people Samantha had obviously come to know as close friends had introduced themselves, some more tactfully than others.
Steve Rogers, Clint Barton, Natasha Romanoff, and Bruce Banner all seemed like genuinely good people, who cared bout his sister. The self described genius-playboy-billionaire-philanthropist, Tony Stark, just seemed like a complete asshole. Micheal really couldn't understand how the hell Samantha could put up with him.
By the third day, Samantha had gently, and subtly, managed to make him feel guilty as hell over almost severely hurting Bruce. Maybe he was just being paranoid, but he had a strong gut feeling that she really liked the guy.
Not too surprisingly, definitely not to Samantha at least, on the fourth day he found himself apologizing to the good Dr. for choking the shit out of him, repeatedly. As it turned out, from what he had been told about Bruce, Micheal was the lucky one.
'So this guy can turn into a huge-green-rage-monster at the drop of a credit... and my little sister is attracted to him... I think the two of us will have a nice little chat, when I can get him alone...', Micheal simmered, as he stared at Bruce from across the dinner table.
Seeing that her brother was practically glaring at Bruce for the last minute or so, Samantha jabbed him in the ribs with her elbow.
Micheal almost jumped out of his seat, she had always been the only person who could ever actually take him by surprise. A very amused Micheal thought, 'Ouch! Dammit, how does she do that? Hell, I never even let Tali sneak up...'
Everyone at the table couldn't help noticing the dark and somber expression that came over his face at that moment. It made Samantha all the more determined to find out with was hurting him so badly inside.
"Oh... that's interesting. Watch out there Bruce... Looks like your already on Big Brother's shit list.", snarked a grinning Tony, even as he received the patented 'Commander Shepard Glare of Death', twice.
Bruce looked up at hearing his name, "Huh... what? I'm on what now?", his mind had been stuck in a new scientific journal he was reading at the table.
As Samantha looked at Bruce, her glare at Tony turning into a soft smile, she tried to defuse the situation, telling him, "It's nothing Bruce, don't worry about it."
Bruce felt his heart skip a beat at seeing her smile, but still being deeply confused, he said, "Um... sure Samantha... no worrying, got it!" The sudden heat in his cheeks forced him to look down at his food as he pretended to continue reading.
Steve just shook his head, sat back, a gave a deep sigh, 'Why does Tony insist on irritating everyone he meets... and here we go in three, two, one... Huh. I guess not, this ti-'
"Well... I think it's kinda... cute... how overprotective Big Brother is of his little sis. After all, I've seen just how good he always was at protecting her. Especially after I hacked the Infirmary surveillance camera feeds... ", a smug Tony mustered his best shit-eating-grin.
The room was filled with a complete, and extremely tense, silence.
With a dangerous gleam in his eyes, Micheal grinned back at Tony, and calmly said, "My name is Micheal, that's with my friends call me anyway. You can call me Shepard... How about I call you...", He snapped his fingers, a habit he and his sister shared, continuing, "The-Asshole-With-A-Nightlight-In-His-Chest... or just... Asshole, for short."
Steve almost choked on his spaghetti and meatballs, and Bruce couldn't stop himself from laughing slightly as he spoke up, "That kinda has a nice ring to it Tony..." When he looked up and saw the way Micheal and Tony were still glaring at each other he added, "...or not."
Quickly recovering, Steve tried to intervene, "Hey, come on guys... lets not get off on the wrong foot here!" Unfortunately for Steve, and everyone else, Tony didn't know when to shut up.
Tony just smiled, but his eyes sure as hell weren't smiling, as he said, "Very clever... Micheal, I didn't know you were capable of stringing that many words together in a sentence. Oh... and Steve... speaking of getting off, I really think Big Brother here is way to concerned over who his little sister is fucking... Isn't that right, Francis?"
Even if Tony hadn't just shocked Steve and Bruce with his hurtful repeated callousness, or royally pissed off Samantha with his complete invasion of her privacy, it's doubtful they could have stopped what happened a split-second later.
In little more than the blink of an eye, Micheal had bolted up from his sit, reached over the table, grabbed Tony by his throat with one hand, and punched him in the face so hard with the other, that he landed on the kitchen floor with an obviously broken nose.
Samantha and Steve immediately grabbed Micheal before he could do any more harm, as Bruce took some napkins and started to staunch Tony's swiftly bleeding nose.
Looking down at Tony from the other side of the table, Micheal growled, "If you EVER talk about me... or my sister, like that again... I will fucking end you Stark!
"That's ENOUGH!", a bioticly glowing Samantha shouted into Micheal's ear.
Glaring at her brother, then down at the still stunned Tony, she yelled, "What the hell is WRONG with the two of you?" Then she let out a massively irritated huff of air, as she continued to yell, "Do I have to put both of you in goddamn Stasis, in separate corners for fuck sake! Stop acting like fucking children, and get the fuck along with each other. NOW!
Steve and Bruce found themselves incredibly impressed with how fast Tony and Micheal managed to get back in their seats.
A slightly calmer Samantha nodded at them and said, "That's better. Now, Bruce could you please go and get some of the medi-gel Tony cooked up in his lab?"
"On it!", Bruce said, as he was already running, and thinking, 'Not gonna take the elevator, to damn slow... last thing I need is her angry with me too!' He probably set a few records of his own, as he somehow managed to run down to Tony's lab, get the sample, and run back in under two minutes.
As soon as Steve and Bruce had, painfully, reset Tony's nose they applied a bit of medi-gel to heal the skin and cartilage, almost instantaneously.
Samantha quietly asked him, "Tony, are you alright?"
Tony, just barely, avoided flinching at the sound of her voice, and softly said, " Yup. I'm good... no complaints whatsoever.
Samantha gave Tony and Micheal a look that could melt steel, calmly telling them, "Micheal, Tony, you are going to apologize for being complete and utter assholes to each other tonight, then we are going to have a relaxing and pleasant dinner. Do I make myself clear?"
The two men shook hands over the table and murmured half-assed apologies to one another, thanks to one of the oldest fears in the universe. The wrath of a righteously pissed off woman. Who, in this case, could smash them into a fine paste, if so desired.
Archer83: Wow... that got a little tense Sam.
Samantha Shepard: Archer... Please shut up and eat your spaghetti and meatballs.
Archer83: ... Yes ma'am.
A/N: Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned... indeed! Just be glad for Tony's sake that Micheal didn't have a pistol! Yup another dark chapter full of angst filled drama. Don't worry folks the next chapter will be full of action and deep space daring-do! Wait... I've said too much already!
Now here's anything and everything you might want to know about Micheal Shepard:
If it isn't obvious by now, Micheal lost everyone in his universe, except Joker and EDI, who would have been most likely killed during the events of Mass Effect 3. This wasn't due to any negligence on his part, he did his best to protect them and had his ship and crew fully prepared for the last mission. He even went to rescue his kidnapped crew as fast as possible. But as the poet Robert Burns wrote, 'The best laid schemes of mice and men, often go awry.'
He is most definitely a Renagon personality, so he might not always be the nicest guy, or easy to get along with, but he'll always at least try do the right thing at the end of the day. This stems from the different events during the colony raid and Micheal basically being forced to kill Samantha.
He will absolutely do whatever it takes to get the job done, preferring to risk himself as much, or more than, anyone under his command. Because of this, he was best known for winning the Battle of Elysium for which he was awarded the Star of Terra. (War Hero back story.)
While both of them have excellent weapons training, I'm planing on having him be more adept at using technology than his sister. (Engineer class.) Essentially, he's going to be the polar opposite, or at least a darker version, of Samantha.
Please leave a review and let me know what you think!