Shepard remembers the first half-hour or so of the slaver attack on Mindoir. There are no graphic details, but it is a dark chapter. I can't overstress the trigger warning for threats of rape, actual violence against minors, and suggested violence. The triggery parts are italicized, so if that is a risk, I suggest skipping to the horizontal line.
"Your nature will be revealed to us. Accept that," the deep, throaty, many-layered whisper declared. The oily-tar spiders swarmed up the back of Shepard's skull, their slick carapaces glinting with the living, frigid darkness that attacked her on the Citadel. Struggling to be the first to slip between the folds of her brain, to discover all her secret terrors and loves, they clambered over each other in an ever-shifting mass. "Your mind belongs to us."
Shepard shifted in her sleep, murmuring, her brow creasing even as she curled into the warm blankets and the hard angles of the arms that held her.
Darkness. Beautiful, cool, safe darkness. Janey burrowed deeper into the warmth of her blankets, eyes closed, lips curved into a blissful smile as she listened to the orchestra of hoppers and night birds outside her window. Early spring perfumed the air with the rich green, honey scent of the budding trees coloured with a sprinkling of floral tones. Even though the night air still dropped near freezing, she kept her windows open to invite in the elusive, magical spirits of spring.
Small, bare feet padded over the hardwood that lined the hall, hesitating for a moment at the threshold of Jane's room. "Janey?" When she didn't answer, the footsteps continued across the metre of floor, stopping at the edge of her bed. "Janey?"
She smiled and cracked one eye open. "What is it, Bunny? You're supposed to have gone to sleep an hour ago."
"I was asleep, honest." Big eyes stared into hers, their pupils eating up almost all the bright green iris. "But there's a monster in the house. I saw it downstairs. It has four eyes."
"There's no such thing as . . .." A crash from the main floor punched a fistful of claws through Jane's chest, wrenching her up off the mattress by its grip around her heart. "Mom? Dad?" The words drifted pale and helpless into the darkness, the claws scratching up her throat to pinch her larynx closed.
A piercing shriek ripped the air, echoing up the stairs. Throwing back her covers, Jane scrambled off the bed, snatching for Bunny's hand and gripping it tight. Panic froze her in place as half of her insisted on racing down to her parents, while the other half dragged her to the window, demanding that she get Bunny to safety.
The stairs thundered under running feet. For a breathless moment, she stared through her open door into the hall, every inch of her body trembling as she prayed for her father to appear. A harsh, jagged sob of relief met his blood-streaked face as it raced in the door. He slammed Jane's bedroom door shut behind him, locking it.
"Get to the window." His voice slapped her hard, shattering the ice that held her in place. He jammed Jane's desk chair under the doorknob. "Hurry."
Jane did as she was told, reacting robotically to the fear in her father's voice. She pulled the screen out of the window and lifted Bunny out onto the roof.
"Run to the woods," her father ordered, his strong arm helping Jane out onto the roof. His kiss impacted her cheek like a punch, his long stubble scratching her skin. "Head for the big rock across the creek. Hide. We'll come for you when we can." Pounding on the other side of the door dragged his attention from them. "Move fast and keep to the shadows," he called over his shoulder, running to brace the door. "We'll come for you."
Jane hesitated, her heart colder and harder than the slate shingles under her bare feet. "Dad? Daddy . . . why . . . what's going on?" Her gaze flicked back and forth between the door and her dad, the whole universe tumbling around her, crashing and lopsided as if she were a pair of running shoes thrown into the dryer.
The door burst open in a hail of splintered wood. "Run!" her father bellowed, the single word drowning under the swell of Bunny's screaming. He spun to face the six, shadowy figures that shoved and kicked their way through the broken door. "Run and don't . . .." A muffled crunching sound accompanied a thick, wet scream . . . a broken, terrified sound she'd never imagined her father could make. A single, violent heave spewed popcorn and soda from their earlier vid-night down the front of her pyjamas, but she didn't move . . . couldn't move, despite the hot mass of sick rolling down her chest. Finally, she heard a heavy thump, her heart knowing that was her father's body hitting the floor. Its terrible finality cut into her like the lash of a bullwhip, driving her into action.
Jane caught a glimpse of four, black eyes in the dark window before she half-crawled, half-slid on her backside down the slope of the roof. Arms lunged through the open portal. As fingers grabbed the fabric of Bunny's nightgown, the child lived up to her nickname, letting out a thin, 'rabbit in hawk's claws' wail of fear. Jane lunged, animal and fierce, her teeth sinking into the monster's flesh hard enough that blood oozed over her tongue. A vicious shake of her head earned a garbled curse, and she let go, snarling at the attacker as the hand yanked back inside. Gagging and spitting, she dragged Bunny the rest of the way down to the eaves and the three metre drop to the lawn.
"Wait here," she called, inch-worming her way over the edge. "I'll catch you." She dropped off the roof, her ankle letting out a grinding yelp as she hit the ground, and fell onto her backside. Scrambling, she jumped up, holding her arms out. "Come on. Jump. I'll catch you."
Bunny lowered herself, little feet kicking as she wriggled over the edge.
"Okay, you're only a few centimetres away from my hands, just let go." Jane looked behind her, hearing screaming from more houses in their little development. Her guts loosened, rolling with a sick gurgling. Mrs. Pagette ran out her front door, just to be dragged down, smashing her head on her stairs. Three men tore away her nightdress, then dragged her out of sight. In less than five seconds, Mrs. Pagette and her attackers vanished into the darkness. Jane's stomach heaved again.
"God damn it, Bunny, just let go," Jane growled, low and fierce, terror turning to rage. Bunny dropped, a feather-weight easily caught. Setting the child down, Jane grabbed one small hand in hers and bolted for the woods behind the house.
Time counted down in heartbeats, her pulse so loud in her ears that she couldn't detect any sign of pursuit. Still, she didn't slow, her feet racing over the wet, slippery leaves and stabbing twigs, squelching through mud as the trees closed in around them, wrapping them in comforting camouflage. So close. Jane felt the call of the huge, cracked glacier rock on the other side of the creek.
"Hurry. I'll keep you safe if you can just get to me," it whispered on the breeze. It helped slow the frantic hummingbird wings thumping inside her chest and eased the terrible, watery sloshing in her bowels. If they could just make it to the rock. If they could just make it.
Bunny lagged, pulling back hard on Jane's hand like a weanling calf sitting back to resist being halter broken. "Slow down," the child wailed. "Where's Mommy and Daddy?" She stumbled and fell on her face in a bawling heap. Holding up a heavily bleeding hand, she screamed, "Janey, I want Mommy." Jane stopped and turned back, lifting the weeping girl back onto her feet.
"They'll meet us at the rock." She kissed the cut across the child's palm. "Come on, we're just about to the creek," Jane whispered between gasping breaths. "You can do it. Just keep running." She tugged hard on the hand, hauling the small anchor along behind her.
"Look what we've got here." A nightmarish form unfolded from the darkness shrouding the path ahead. If it hadn't spoken, Jane could have dismissed it as a shadow but for the chilling, hard gleam that leered at her from all four eyes. "Thought you could outrun us, did you?" The terrible shadow laughed and lunged toward her.
Jane threw herself backward, feet scrambling as she tried to stop. Slipping on the dew-slick path, she went down, her backside splashing into a puddle of muck. Bunny squawked in pain, dragged down along with Jane, one tiny arm twisted at a strange angle. It snapped, a dry twig under their combined weight, but Bunny merely whimpered and cowered close, tunneling into Jane's side.
The batarian towered over them, reaching for Bunny first. He lifted the child by the collar of her nightshirt and shoved her toward another figure, that one huffing and wheezing from the chase. "Take this back to the cages for their street." He cocked his head as his eyes slid over to Jane. "Going to take a little time with this one." Grabbing a handful of long, red hair, he dragged her to her knees. "Caught us a tasty looking piece of young meat here."
"You sure you don't want me to stay, Remit? That one looks like a fighter." The second batarian stalked around Jane in a wide circle.
Remit laughed, deep and vicious. "You just want to stuff yours into whatever's left over. Ha!" The batarian pushed Shepard's head back, forcing her face up to look at him. Rough fingers shoved themselves into her mouth, choking her into another moment of paralysis, but then her fight kicked in, and she bit down as hard as she could.
Slamming her hand down on the slaver's knuckles, Jane broke his hold on her hair and twisted hard to the side. Sweeping out with her leg, she dumped Remit onto his ass then kicked straight out, catching him under the chin with her heel. He yelled, but fell back, stunned. Jane scrambled to her feet, spitting blood from where one of her teeth had snapped off in Remit's finger, and launched herself toward Bunny. Before she wrestled the child loose, Remit's hand buried itself in her hair again.
He yanked her back, shaking her like a pyjak in varren jaws. An open hand slammed into the side of her head. Her jaw cracked as the eye on that side of her head tried to explode out onto her cheek. She dropped, head ringing and fuzzy. Still, she clawed at the ground, trying to stand . . . to get to Bunny . . . to get them both safe. Daddy trusted her to keep Bunny safe.
"Look, meat," Remit said, his voice a low, rolling growl, "if you fight me, I'll tie you to that tree over there and make you watch as I do every single twisted, agonizing thing I plan to do to you, 'cept on that little one over there." He yanked her around and onto her feet, his bleeding and torn fingers digging into her jaw as he forced her to look at the other slaver holding Bunny.
The child kicked and screamed.
"So, what's it going to be? You going to pucker up and bend over like a good little whore, or do I tear your baby . . . sister? neice? cousin? to shreds?"
Jane stared at Bunny, that precious and precocious treasure dangling from the other slaver's hand, and nodded once. She spewed vomit, heaving up as much blood as bile. Retch after retch, her stomach forced the slaver back enough to give her a moment to shut the pain and cold into a dark room at the back of her mind. Collapsing into his grip, she managed to gasp out, "Look away, Bunny. Don't watch."
"Who knows," Remit said, laughing through the words as he wrestled her limp body around to face him. One hand gripped her throat as he leaned down to leer at her. "You might just like it."
And the spiders crawled out from under that carefully sealed door, black, slick and wriggling with joy.
Shepard awoke to screaming, shrill and deafening as it echoed in the small, suffocating space.
So dark. Oh God, please . . . it's so dark.
"Shepard. Easy now. Sh." Garrus's face appeared next to her. "It was a nightmare. You're all right."
She thrust him away, his hands too rough, his talons too sharp even through her armour. His touch hurt, biting her skin with electric shocks. Strangled, choking wails clawed their way out of her throat as she fought to be free of the blankets. They tangled around her arms and legs, holding her bound and helpless. Clambering to her feet, she backed into the corner of the troop compartment, eyes searching the darkness for . . . she didn't know what she searched for. Batarians? Whatever intelligence lurked behind the darkness and chill of the glittering, black spiders?
"Oh God." Her legs trembled more violently with every second until they gave out, dumping her onto her knees. Her arms held out a little longer before they gave up as well, spilling her onto her side. Cheek pressed to the cold, metal flooring, Shepard closed her eyes.
Just breathe, Janey. Breathe. You'll be okay. It was just a dream. Just a dream.
Razor-wire tears sliced their way out from under clenched eyelids, bleeding down her face to pool on the Mako's floor. Sobs twisted her body, the wire coiling around her lungs, refusing to let her draw more than hiccoughs of breath. She felt Garrus's stare like barbs under her skin and covered her head with her arms. Why then? She'd kept the door locked tight for so long, how had it broken her control?
A gentle, strong hand pressed between her shoulder blades, rubbing slow circles that felt as if they carved straight into her spine. Her scream threw Garrus back as she scrambled up, crawling across the Mako to where her helmet had rolled up against one of the seats.
"Shepard? What . . .?" Garrus crouched, his hands held out, his face drawn with both fear and concern. "Shepard." He sighed, his mandibles lowering, flicking heavy and slow. "Is it the same as when the orb attacked you?" He shuffled one foot toward her, earning another scream that hit him like a rifle shot, throwing him back.
"Garrus . . ." She swallowed hard, the tears raining all the faster for the pain she saw in his eyes. "I just . . . please, don't touch me." Snatching her helmet off the floor, she wrestled it over her head and clicked the seal. "I need . . . I just need room to breathe. I can't breathe." She flung open the side hatch and swung out, hitting the snow-covered ground running.
"Shepard?" Less than a minute later, she heard footsteps crunching in the snow behind her. "Come back to the Mako. We have maybe three minutes out here before we freeze."
Shepard ran, trying to put some road between herself and the long-neglected grifter pouring snake oil into her blood. Instead, another beckoned to her with an icy finger as it opened its wares. 'Falling asleep and dying peacefully' lay in the case next to 'Never having to remember'. Shaking hands reached out to take the case of icy death. All she had to do was drive Garrus off, or wait for him to give up and return to the Mako to save himself.
He'll never do that, Janey. You know he won't.
Shepard stumbled a little as she ran, her moment of hesitation allowing the dream to catch up, punching straight through her helmet and into her skull. The oily spiders streamed through her, bleeding into her vision, the world burning black at the edges.
Bunny. Her precious Bunny screaming as the batarian dragged Jane up to his face, sniffing her like a dog. "You stink," he said and threw her down the slope into the creek. "Scrub that carcass, meat." The three slavers pelted her with mud and rocks as she washed in the shallow, mucky ice-water.
"Shepard! Stop." Garrus skirted around her, trying to block her flight without making contact. "I won't touch you." He held his hands out as if to show her that he was disarmed. "Just come back in out of the cold before it kills us." When she didn't respond, he went against his word, he gripped her shoulders and shook her. "Shepard. Breathe. Come back to me." Rough hands shook her again, but as the monster closed in, the rest faded into a numb, frozen background.
"Shepard. Come on, Kahri, don't give in to it. Fight!"
The word, the new nickname, like the light it defined, cut through the darkness. The spiders screamed silently, writhing, but in agony rather than with hunger. Garrus's eyes appeared, sharp and focused in front of her face. Oh! That was where it came from. Kahri should be his nickname, not hers.
"Come on, there you are. Focus on me. Fight it back. You did it before with that thing right there." His hand drew her attention away from his eyes as it pressed against her faceplate.
She stared at the two long, taloned fingers and thumb, recalling the tenderness with which he'd looked after her boxer's fractures, the way they'd held her in the dark on Feros . . . that they'd saved her life in that fragile shelter. After a second or two, the spiders drew back enough that she reached up to swipe away the snot that ran from her nose, her hand thumping into her face shield. "I can't, C-Sec. I can't breathe."
"What happened?" She could hear him shivering under his words. "You woke me up. You were screaming." He shuddered. "Spirits, Shepard. I've never heard anyone scream like that." He shook his head. "No, don't . . . forget I asked. Just breathe. Just be here. Here with me."
Shepard started to speak, but then three sets of brilliant, bouncing lights and the sound of engines cut her off. Beautiful, practical, harsh old reality threw a proverbial bucket of ice water over her, breaking the last of the dream's hold. A relieved sigh hissed between her lips, a pressure valve opening.
"Captain Shepard? Officer Vakarian?" a familiar voice called over a loudspeaker.
Shepard lifted a hand to shade her eyes and nodded. "Yes." She heard hatches opening, boots marching in the dry, crunching snow, then shadows appeared, guns held at the ready as they blocked the light from the armoured vehicles.
Thank god for being arrested.
"Sergeant Kaira Sterling," one said, stepping forward, "and it is my duty to place you both under arrest at this time."
"Thank the spirits," Garrus said, mumbling the words under his breath.
"Don't worry, Sergeant, we have no intention to resist. Take us in." She took a deep breath, gripping the control Stirling's arrival offered in slack fingers. She needed to hold it together; she needed to breathe.
Turning back toward the Mako, she asked, "Could someone bring our APC in, please? My guns are in there, and they've been with me a very long time. I'd hate to have to trespass again to get them."
"Your Mako will be impounded and returned to Port Hanshan." The sergeant strode over and held out a hand to usher Shepard toward the lead M29 Grizzly. "After you, Captain . . . unless you'd prefer to be dragged in wearing cuffs?"
Shepard took a long, tremulous breath and nodded. "Cuffs won't be required, thank you."
(A-N: One of these days, I will understand why my characters don't just have happy, uncomplicated lives and histories. Right after that moment, I expect they will explain why they think that it's important for readers to get glimpses of their ugliest moments. I hope I did Janey's demons justice, in the end, without glorifying the horrific. Thank you to my betas and to those who are taking this journey with Shepard and her crew. Love yah. Kim)