Author's note: This story is now rated M, due to course language and mentions of violence, including sexual assault. Nothing is too graphic, but it is harsh enough to warrant the rise in rating. If you are below the age of consent in your country, or if any of these things are offense or a trigger for you, please do reconsider reading this. That being said, to those of you still on board, Thank you for reading and enjoy.
Part 2
"I'm okay," she told him, the words coming out just a little too fast and high pitched. They still might have been somewhat believable however, had she not kept repeating them over and over again.
"Jane," he soothed, trying to take her into his arms. She shrugged him off, finally letting go of his hand in the process. Kaidan massaged the crescent shaped gouges she'd left his palm, trying to get the circulation flowing again.
"I'm fine," She insisted again. "Really, I'm okay…I'm just…fine. We just need to wait for the crisis to pass, or Joker to find us somewhere to dump our heat load and then EDI will start up the elevators again and we'll get out of here right?"
He opened his mouth to answer, but she kept barreling on through. "Of course, right!" Her breathing was getting more and more erratic and Kaidan was starting to worry she'd fall headfirst into a full blown panic attack. "Or better yet," she continued, and Kaidan heard her brushing her hands across the floor and up side of one wall. "We could find another way to get out of here. There has to be an emergency exit for situations like this, right? I'm sure we can find it if we look together."
"Shepard, stop." Kaidan rose to his knees and clasped her shoulders, halting her search. "You know as well as I do that there is no emergency exit. The elevator is sealed tight in case of a hull breach."
"But I can't stay here!" Her voice rose into a higher, more hysterical pitch. "This is my ship and I have no idea what is happening to her or her crew. I don't even have my pistol, and they need me in the war room. I don't have time for this!"
"You have nothing but time." Kaidan's voice was gentle but firm. He slid his hands up to cup her face and felt the hot slide of fresh tears against his fingertips. "You don't need to be ashamed. Everyone is frightened of something."
"Not me!" She cried, gripping his wrists tightly. "Not of this! I am supposed to be the unflappable Commander Shepard. Everyone expects me to be able to save the whole damn Galaxy from the reapers. How do you think they'll react if they find out I'm afraid of the dark, like a fucking child? They won't understand!"
"Do you trust me?" he asked, purposefully softening his voice.
She took a deep, shuddering breath. "You know I do."
"Then, don't worry about what 'they' think. Just tell me." Kaidan moved in close enough to feel her panting breaths puff across his cheek. "Make me understand. No one else has to know."
"You don't want to hear this Kaidan," she told him, desperately. "Hell, I don't even want to hear it and it's my story."
"Let it go Jane," he soothed, pulling her into his chest. "How can the entire galaxy expect you to bear their weight on your shoulders without someone else's to lean on yourself? I can take it," he added, letting her hear the smirk in his voice. "Mine are pretty broad…just saying."
He felt her smile against his skin as she let out a harsh, gasping chuckle. "Alright," she managed to choke out. "But just remember you asked for it. Some things once heard, can never be unheard."
"But a burden shared is half the weight," he countered, and he felt her smile again.
Letting go of some of her ridged control, Shepard allowed Kaidan to once again lower them down to the thinly carpeted floor. He settled his back against the cool metal wall, pulling her up onto his lap for the second time that day. She curled herself around him in that way that always felt like home; cold, little nose brushing the side of his neck, fingers of one hand barely caressing the hair at the base of his skull. He rubbed her back for a few minutes, waiting for her to speak when she was ready.
"They came for us at night," she finally said, her voice low and deceptively calm. "We'd heard the news reports of course, warning that Batarian slavers were attacking human colonies in the Attican Traverse, but we never thought…I mean at least I never thought Mindior was in any danger."
"Shit." The curse hissed out of Kaidan's mouth before he could consciously rein it in. Dread settled low in his stomach. Everyone knew what happened on that colony sixteen years ago, and despite his protestations to the otherwise, Kaidan realized he probably didn't want to hear this.
"I was so naive back then; sixteen years old, colony girl born and bred. I thought deliberately missing curfew to make out with Jeremy Saunders behind the hydroponics lab made me independent and dangerous. I thought giving him a black eye and a bruised groin, when he tried to take more than I wanted to give, made me invincible. I was so angry at him and so full of my own self importance to notice anything out of place on my way home; that none of the streetlights worked, or that Mr. Akuna's Doberman wasn't barking up a storm when I walked passed. I was actually relieved when the backdoor to our farmhouse wasn't locked, because I thought I'd be able to sneak up to my room without getting in trouble."
She took a deep, shuddering breath, and Kaidan ran his hand over her hair a few times in encouragement.
"I wasn't two steps inside the kitchen before getting shoved painfully against the wall. I tried to scream, but my mouth was covered. It only took a second for me to realize it was my mom, but by then I could hear the voices coming from just outside. They were thick and angry, and in a language I'd never heard before. I could tell they were getting closer to us, but I still didn't completely understand what that meant.
"Mom whispered for me to shush and half dragged me over to the utility closet on the other side of the room. Inside was the access hatch to the crawl space that ran the length of our house. She opened it and shoved me inside so fast I scraped my arm on one of the metal hinges.
"She bent down to talk to me and I finally got a good look at her in the dim light. She was in her favorite flannel pajamas; the ones with pink pyjaks on them. Our hunting rifle was slung across one of her shoulders and I still remember thinking the combination looked ridiculous. But then she grabbed my wrist to get my attention and we finally made eye contact. I'd never seen that expression on her face before; tense and stern, with wide terrified eyes. She'd always been the 'easier' parent, you know; all laughter, and comfort, and love. She was the one who always played devil's advocate to Dad's uncompromising discipline. But right then…God, I can't even describe the desperation I saw in her. That's what really made me understand we were in serious trouble…well, that and what she said next. Her voice was so soft I almost couldn't make it out."
Kaidan felt Shepard's hands clench tightly at the front of his shirt, her breathing becoming erratic again. He gently brushed his lips against her temple. "It's alright," he told her. "I'm here. Keep going."
"It was the last thing she ever said to me," Shepard continued. "'Keep quiet. Stay down. Stay hidden.' She made me promise not to make a sound, no matter what happened, and to wait for her while she went to get my dad and little sister. And then she closed the hatch and locked me in. I heard her whisper, 'I love you, baby,' but then there was nothing for several, long minutes. And then, all I heard was screaming."
"Jesus, Jane." Kaidan felt his own eyes start to prickle with unshed tears. "I'm so sorry."
"I couldn't see a thing. It was pitch black in that crawlspace, but I could tell what was going on. The Pirates must have found my mother right away; she never got a chance to use that rifle.
"They dragged my sister down the stairs first. She was struggling like crazy and crying out loud enough to wake the dead. Grace was only ten, but I knew from experience that she packed a good punch. She must have gotten one of the pirates really good, because he dropped her for a second. I heard her run into the yard, screaming for someone to help her, but I figure by then no one was left that wasn't trying to save themselves. I didn't hear it, but I know they caught her again at some point, because I never saw Gracie again. After I enlisted, I used Alliance resources to track her down. It took me five years to find her, but only three for her to die in a Batarian Platinum mine."
Kaidan had to bite the inside of his cheek to keep from moaning out loud. He buried a hand in Shepard's hair and rocked them a bit, desperate to provide a little comfort.
"After Gracie ran out of the house, the pirates dragged my parents into the living room. I slid through the crawl space as quietly as I could, inching along until I was on the other side of the wall from them. Everyone was shouting all at once and I couldn't make everything out. My dad got knocked around a bit; I could hear the telltale sounds of flesh and bone against more flesh and bone. My mom was sobbing, practically begging them to stop. After a little while, one of the Batarians spoke up in thickly accented English. He said the colony registry listed our house as having four occupants, but they'd only found three. He wanted to know where the missing child was. He wanted to know where I was.
"My mom said she didn't know what they were talking about. She insisted the registry must have been wrong, that no one else lived there. He hit her a few times, but she kept repeating the same thing over and over again. Then they started laying into my dad some more. I guess they were hoping that either he was more likely to talk or that hurting him would upset my mom enough to do so.
"I have no idea how long that went on; maybe minutes, maybe hours, but neither of them ever even admitted I existed, let alone was hiding just a few feet away. I had to bite my hand to stop myself calling out to them.
When they realized they couldn't beat the information out of my parents, the slavers decided to change tactics. The one who spoke English told my mom they'd lose money if they left without me. If she didn't tell them where I was, they'd have to take their money's worth out of her. And…Oh God Kaidan, I was old enough to know what they meant by that and I wanted so badly to bust myself out from behind that wall and stop it all. But I was too scared. I didn't want to die and I didn't want them to do to me what they were going to do to my mother."
Kaidan gently shushed her. "There wasn't anything you could have done, Baby." He tried to blink his tears away again, but a few escaped to slowly slide down his cheeks. "They would have just gotten you too."
Shepard continued as if she hadn't heard him, the words pouring out of her in a desperate, sobbing rush. "My dad started hollering at them not to touch her. There was a quick, loud ripping sound and the Batarian asked one more time where I was. Mom got really, really quiet, and for a minute I was terrified they'd killed her already. When she finally spoke, her voice was as clear and confident as I'd ever heard it. She said, 'there's no one.'
"I heard them throwing some furniture around and then they started laughing and ripping her clothes some more. By that point I was biting my hand so hard blood was starting to drip down my arm, but I couldn't even feel it past the burning in my chest. I couldn't let myself breathe, or I'd scream.
"When they'd got their money's worth out of her, they shot both my parents in the head without a second thought. I heard the two blasts, one right after the other, and then the bastards just walked right out of the house as if going for a Sunday stroll. I knew they were gone, but I still couldn't move for the longest time. I kept expecting them to come back and find me.
"I'm really not sure how long I sat, curled up in that tiny, dark space behind the walls. When I finally heard voices again I was too terrified to call for help. They must have had scanners, and in hindsight I realize it's a miracle the Batarians didn't have any, because The Alliance found me right away. I wouldn't answer them, so they had to have one of their soldiers climb in and drag me out. I gave him a broken nose for his efforts."
Kaidan's laugh was watery, but sincere. "That's my girl."
"It must have looked like something out of a horror vid to those soldiers: an entire colony of dead adults; all the children missing; and then they go and pull me out of a crawl space, all kicking, and screaming, with blood all over my mouth and down my arm. They had to sedate me to get me out of the house. Next morning I woke up in an Alliance hospital, scrubbed clean and wearing new clothes. The only physical evidence of my ordeal was a medigel wrap taped to my hand. I'd bitten clean through to the muscle, still had the scar until Cerberus rebuilt me.
"I remember," Kaidan told her. He reached over to trace his thumb over the soft, unblemished skin of her palm. "I always wondered where you got it."
"It was a reminder of the first people that ever died for me; the first ones I wasn't strong enough to save."
"No, Jane." Kaidan had to swallow a few times to keep the tears out of his voice. "You were barely more than a child at the time. You can't blame yourself for what happened."
"I know it wasn't my fault!" Shepard's voice was raspy with remembered rage. "There were enough therapy sessions over the year and a half I spent in the Alliance orphanage to explain that particular truth to me. But she was my mother, Kaidan, and I sat less than four feet away, doing absolutely nothing while God knows how many Batarian Slavers raped her for their fucking amusement! She didn't make a sound the entire time, but my dad was screaming like a wounded animal. I'd never known before then that humans could even make sounds like that. And when they were done, the bastards dispatched them as indifferently as culling a herd of weak animals! My baby sister got it even worse; it took her three whole years to die a slow and horrible death, without anyone to comfort her. And I know there wasn't anything I could do to stop any of it, but that's the point, Kaidan; I was helpless."
He doesn't know what to say to that. She's right, and it was awful, and it's all he can do not to sob into her shoulder at the injustice of it all.
"It's been fifteen years, but every time I'm in complete darkness I still remember being that frightened girl. It's a surprisingly easy thing to hide. When I'm on an assignment I can push the pain and the fear away, because I'm Commander Fucking Shepard and I've got my M-98 Widow and a job to do. But when it's just me…when it's just Jane in the dark, alone with the memories, I…" Jane had to stop to take another shuddering breath. "I'm suddenly back in that crawl space. I can feel the pounding of my heart and the ache in my hand. I can smell the musty combination of dust and farm equipment. All I can hear is my mother refusing to tell that bastard where I was, regardless of what they were going to do to her."
"What was her name?" Kaidan had a sudden, burning need to know this. "Your mother, what was her name?"
Shepard inelegantly wiped her dripping nose before answering. "Hannah," she said, tears choking her voice, "Hannah Shepard."
"I wish I could meet her." Kaidan told her, pride coloring the words. "I wish I could shake her hand. I wish I could hold her in my arms and thank her for giving me, not the Galaxy, but me the opportunity to know you, to love you."
"She would have loved you," Shepard told him. "She was always scolding me for the bad boys I ran around with. If I brought your Boy Scout ass home she would have fallen at your feet and demanded you marry me on the spot."
They both laughed at this, and the sound was rough, and bittersweet, and cathartic. Kaidan reached up to caress her cheek, wiping the tears away with a swipe of his thumb. "I wish I could meet your mother," he said again, "but I don't have to."
"And why is that?"
"Because Jane," he said, letting her hear the adoration in his voice. "I know you, and you are exactly like her."
