Noble Savage

The Citadel was a strange, wondrously frightening place to Shepard, as far removed from anything he had ever seen before as the stars had been before he'd been taken. The sight that greeted him as he strode out onto the presidium proper was enough to make him forget the fury that had been steadily growing since Garrus had informed him that his contacts had located Kaidan.

The engineers above his little cubbyhole on the engineering deck had been walking on eggshells for the entire duration of the trip to the Citadel, and for good reason: Shepard had spent the time alternatively pacing, abusing his surroundings or putting a new edge on his spears and sword. (It had come as an unpleasant surprise to Shepard that he was absolutely worthless with a gun any larger than a sub-machine gun, though even he could appreciate the humour in the irony.)

But now he goggled and gawked and stared, amazement and horror radiating from him in every way possible.

On the one hand, it was one of the cleanest, quietest, most picturesque and enormous places he had ever seen. After years living on Omega, with its ugly narrow streets and steel ceiling where skies should be the Citadel came as a shock. The rivers and lakes full of placid, pristine water reflected the artificial sky like a mirror and blended seamlessly with the gleaming metals and immaculate ceramics of the roads and abodes that seemed to stretch from one sloping horizon to the next like a dream from out of the Old World, while the verdant greenery, perfectly sculpted trees and bright flowerbeds dotting them provided a glimpse of what his home world might have been like before it was scourged by nuclear fire. It seemed like a terrible transgression to live in such a place: to Shepard's mind, it should have been a place visited only, to remind those who came there that not everything was made of hardness and sharp edges. It should have been a temple, not a fortress.

On the other hand Shepard was horrified that such excess even existed. He could only imagine the effort that had to be expended to keep a place such as this, with its streets packed with such strange and fantastical creatures, clean and unmarred by the ravages of time and the careless desecrations that came with civilized life. He wouldn't have known it, but hundreds of years in the past he would have been a cliché with the way he scowled when he saw a gaggle of laughing asari carelessly tossed the plastic wrappings from their meal into a carefully tended garden without a second thought. It disgusted him to see the thoughtless disregard for the beauty that surrounded them. He wished that he could put them in chains on Omega, or drop them into the wasteland with nothing but the clothes on their back.

In fact, there were a lot of people he wanted to do that to. Something to think on later, perhaps.

"Uhm, s-sir?" a worried attendant stammered at him. "I think you're, uhm, underdressed."

And, truth be told, he was. It had taken an executive order from Garrus and numerous complaints to see to it that he "burned that filthy rag he called pants and put on some real clothes", and even then they had had to steal said rag while he was in the shower. (Ironically enough, there wasn't a person aboard the Lariat cleaner than the tribal human, as there wasn't a living being that could have dragged him out of the bathroom until he was wrinkled as a prune once he discovered the wonders of running hot water. Clean water by itself had been something worth fighting over back in the wasteland, but hot water was something Shepard was prepared to wage a holy war for.) It had been very hard to argue the order while cowering behind a shower panel to preserve his modesty. All the same, there was no force in heaven or earth that could force him to cover his marks as a warrior. He wore the heavy boots and he wore the loose-fitting pants donated to the cause by Samara, but from the belly up he was as naked as he had ever been. It didn't seem to matter how many trips he had to make to the infirmary, his hide and pride were armour enough for him.

Shepard looked away from his awe and disgust to address an Asari wearing a nervous but polite smile.

"No, it's quite warm here," he said, and then remembered a few of the lectures he'd received from Hadrian on formality. (And basic table manners. Which was something of a sad statement in itself, considering the person doing the lecturing didn't have cheeks.) "Thank you for your concern," it sounded rehearsed even to Shepard.

"Uhm, uhm, I have a coat you could borrow," the woman offered, desperation plain in her voice.

Shepard frowned, wondering what she was getting at. He slowly looked skywards, noticed the slowly moving clouds, and his mouth dropped open with amazement.

"It rains here?" he exclaimed excitedly. Then he glowered over at Garrus. "You told me the sky was fake!"

The Spectre shook his head, amused and dismayed at the Human's antics.

"It is," he reassured the ambivalent human. "She just doesn't want you running around half-naked."

Shepard raised an eyebrow at this, and gave a critical glance downwards to himself.

"Half-naked?" he said, confused. "I'm covering everything essential!"

"I know," the spectre agreed patiently, well aware that this probably wouldn't be the last time they would have this conversation. "It's just that you look very similar to an Asari, and they generally don't show off so much... chest."

"Are you saying that I look like a woman?" Shepard accused with a dirty look.

Garrus's mandibles twitched with amusement, a Turian grin for a mouth without lips, but didn't rise to the bait.

"We should make our way to the C-sec academy, in the lower wards," he said, ignoring the accusation completely. "They have- your friend is there."

Shepard scowled, gripping his headless spear tightly in his hand. (C-sec had taken the entirely reasonable stance that, hopelessly outdated though they were, spears and swords were still weapons and thus needed to be confiscated. Shepard had responded to this by removing one of the wickedly barbed spearheads and claiming the now mostly harmless length of slender metal as a walking aid. And because he only had one eye and an expression that promised a painful death to anyone that challenged him on it, nobody had argued the point.) If he noticed the slight hesitation, he didn't show it.

"You still haven't explained what he was doing here," he growled angrily.

"I thought it would be best if you heard it from him," Garrus deflected.

"He won't be able to," the human struck the ground with the butt of his spear for emphasis. "He'll be lucky if he has time to scream. He needs to pay for what he did."

Garrus made an unfamiliar expression that Shepard couldn't decipher. He was tempted to call it pity, or disappointment.

"I get that. I do," the Spectre placated patiently. "If it happened to me, I would probably want to kill him too. But you might want to hear him out."

Shepard sneered and stamped the butt of his spear against the ground again, this time in agitation.

"We'll see," he agreed reluctantly. "But don't get your hopes up."

He owed the Turian nothing. His life had been saved only so that he could risk it in a fight he had no stake in. But he wasn't ungrateful, either. It would have been easy for the spectre to chalk Shepard up as a loss and to move on to other potential recruits. And he had also upheld his half of their agreement: Kaidan's death was at hand.

Shepard didn't trust Garrus, of course, because trust was a currency he had precious little of these days, but there was a measure of respect. What he had seen and heard of the Turian led Shepard to believe that he was worthy of it. The crew of the ship could hardly shut up about all the things he had done and the good he had accomplished. The adventures of the previous incarnation of the Lariat would be impressive if even half of them were accurate.

And if Garrus felt that that Kaidan deserved a moment's hesitation, then perhaps there was a reason for it. A moment then. The time Kaidan would need to show his true colours: a coward, or a traitor.

The wards weren't nearly as impressive after the awe-inspiring beauty of the presidium, and their dense throngs of peoples and bright lights reminded Shepard uncomfortably of Omega and the time he had spent there. As strange as it seemed, in retrospect their situation didn't seem too bad. Their days hadn't always been filled with fighting and death and hatred. There had been time enough for friendship, for stories, for songs and, after one particularly memorable raid, even a drunken celebration. (Ryncol, it turned out, was actually quite palatable once it was mixed with something only slightly healthier for human biology: fire.) The inhabitants were cleaner and more polite, but there was a certain hunger in their eyes that Shepard found unsettling.

It had to be something with the way they lived. It seemed unnatural for so many people to live so closely, so densely. Omega had been the same, but there had always been the pervading feeling that it hadn't been a choice. Everyone on Omega who suffered had nowhere else to go, and everyone else was there to profit from it. That much Shepard could understand. His mother had been a slave, after all. But the Citadel wasn't like anything he'd experienced before.

It was as if everyone were wholly divorced from the world, living instead inside their own private realities. For all that they lived so closely, there was little community. Even the Turians, for all that they painted themselves with tribal markings, didn't adhere to anything resembling community. They were all alone, performing little jobs.

If everything around them were to fall apart, who would these people look to for aid? Who would bind them, guide them, fight with and for them? Strangers. Soldiers, with names and ranks and tribes of their own.

Soldiers very like those he was looking at right now.

Garrus had explained to Shepard what a C-sec officer was, once. A mix of arbiter of justice and a standing army. It was... a strange idea.

But not an altogether unpleasant one.

It was the polar opposite of his life back in the Wasteland, where he'd been raised and trained to kill and steal from others. All of his knowledge had been focussed that goal, and look where that had gotten him: enslaved to creatures with better technology than him. Maimed. Alone.

How might things have changed if his tribe was devoted to protecting? Probably not at all, but what of him?

Thoughts for later.

But not now.

Kaidan.

Shepard could see him, locked away safely in a cell. He sat upon a cot, his knees brought up to his face and his arms resting upon them, as if he were trying to hide himself away. His skin, already ugly and warped by the burns he had suffered, now had an unhealthy pallor to it. It was equally clear that he wasn't eating well, and not just from the tray of food that looked to be untouched resting on the floor at the foot of his bed. His arms looked thinner, and the veins stood out more than they ever had.

The tribesman cast a suspicious look to Garrus, who merely shrugged and pointed to the door beside the viewing window.

"You've been given access," he said without inflection. "He's all yours."

Something was wrong about all of this.

Slowly, almost warily, Shepard approached the door. It slid open without a sound, and the uneasiness only mounted. It seemed all too easy after all he had gone through. After the days of slaughter, his recovery, the missions... to just through a door? There had to be something else to it. Some trick.

But looking at Kaidan, it was hard to see one.

Shepard had carried with him an image, an idea of how Kaidan should have been.

He imagined that his former comrade had sold them out for material things, like wealth or food or safety or warmth. Things that every human longed for but hadn't enjoyed in abundance for generations. He'd imagined Kaidan, fat and happy from his dishonest gains.

Shepard could have understood that. Who didn't want a full belly every night and a safe place to rest their head? That was worth fighting for. Killing for, even. Perhaps not betrayal, but the fundamentals of life were called such with good reason.

But now that Shepard had gotten closer he could see that Kaidan was worse off now than he ever had while fighting for the Blood Pack, which was a sorry statement in itself considering that he had been half-incinerated in their service. Ugly welts, black and blue by now, had blossomed across his body without any particular pattern. It was impossible to tell what had caused them, but whatever it was it had happened a great many times. Padded bandages

Shepard looked at him, and for the first time in recollection he hesitated. He cast a glance to Garrus, but there was no help coming from there. What happened next was Shepard's call, and only his.

Uncertain, the human forced back the rage that had been building up inside him for months. It wasn't very difficult: it was hard to hate someone who looked so pathetic. He crouched down to Kaidan's level, searching for the other man's eyes. They were hidden, buried in his knees and arms.

"Kaidan," the former chief said firmly.

The utterance of his name was like magic, as it snapped the other human out of whatever internal hell he was languishing in instantly. His head snapped up, and his eyes blinked in confusion. He turned his head slowly to look towards Shepard, then recoiled in horror when he saw him.

"Shepard!" he said with a gasp, scrabbling away from Shepard as if he were a monster. "You're- but you- they said you-!"

The dishevelled man opened and closed his mouth dumbly, his eyes wild and confused.

"You can't be here! You're dead! They told me they killed you! They- they- oh god, you're alive!" Kaidan gave out a sound like a gasp and a sob.

"Kaidan!" Shepard barked sharply. "Stop that! Focus!"

"It really is you!" Kaidan exclaimed, and the joy in his voice was such that Shepard could only gape in surprise. "I'm so glad! They told us they killed everyone! Then- then they lied! They lied to me! The tribe's alive! And here! Ha-hah!"

Kaidan surged forward and embraced Shepard with such ferocity that Shepard was certain his bones would ache.

"This- this is fantastic!" he cheered happily. "This is wonderful! Where's the rest of the tribe? How are the children?"

"They're dead," Shepard growled, and violently pushed his former friend away from him. "They're all dead. I'm the only one left."

"What? But-" Kaidan's eyes went wide with horror. He sagged down to the floor, his joy from a moment ago forgotten. "Oh no. Oh god no."

It was hard to hate him. All but impossible, in fact. But Shepard managed it somehow, if only just a little.

"They're all dead because of you," he accused.

Kaidan looked up at him, a hunted look in his eyes.

"We didn't mean to," he mumbled. "They said they would take us home. Keep us free, and secret."

"We were asleep when they came for us!" Shepard wasn't shouting. Not quite. But the volume and tone in which he was speaking made it clear that it wouldn't take much for him to start. "They killed us in our beds!"

"We didn't mean to!" Kaidan wailed desperately, and sobbed.

A flash of fury twisted through Shepard at the display, and it was all he could do to restrain himself from whipping the spear shaft across Kaidan's skull and smearing the contents inside across the floor. Something about what Kaidan was saying finally registered, a single word.

He snatched Kaidan by his hair and yanked him up so that he could glower at him with his one remaining eye. Kaidan's eyes were wild, darting from side to side for something to save him.

"What do you mean, 'we'?" he voice was almost a low growl.

"We- she- we talked about it. Without you," Kaidan babbled with fear. "We knew we couldn't stay: we'd be killed! All of us! We had to run! We had to go home!"

Something cold ran up Shepard's spine, a terrible suspicion.

"Who?" he asked, his voice hollow.

"She went crazy when they told us what they had planned," the words came fast and terrified "She cut us a path out, but she got hurt, and we-"

"Who?!" Shepard roared.

Kaidan flinched away from him, his eyes screwed shut.

"Ash Tree," he said, defeated. "She's- they're taking care of her."

It didn't come as a relief to know she was alive. It didn't make him happy.

His blood turned to ice, his stomach dropped and the world suddenly lurched. He released Kaidan, his hands no longer possessing the strength to hold him.

Ash Tree.

His mind dredged up the hazy memories of the days he'd spent in constant conflict. He tried to recall the faces of the fallen, tried desperately to remember seeing her face among them. He tried to recall her death, her scream of defiance.

He couldn't.

He'd thought it had just been the battle-haze and fatigue, but he had no memory of her demise. He'd merely assumed she had been killed in her sleep, like so many others. But she hadn't. She hadn't even been there.

Ash Tree was alive.

And she'd betrayed them. Betrayed he him.

There was lead in his bones, weighing him down and freezing his core.

"Why?" he didn't ask anyone specifically. He didn't even mean for it to be heard. All the same, Kaidan answered.

"Ash Tree said we had to leave. Even if we won, we'd starve. She- I said I would talk to the Eclipse. They- they said they'd take us home. That it was better we disappeared," Kaidan hunched into a ball once again, burying his face in his knees. "They promised us!"

Shepard looked down at the creature that his friend had become, saw the anguish and pain he felt upon recollection of what he'd done... and found he couldn't bring himself to hate him. There was only disgust and pity for someone he'd once held in esteem, now brought low.

It wasn't a pleasant feeling. Hate and fury were easy to deal with. This... not so much.

He watched Kaidan for a few moments more, only leaving when the other man began to sob with ragged breaths. There was nothing for him there: revenge against Kaidan was a wasted effort. There was nothing he could do to him that would trump the suffering he was in right now.

He turned to Garrus, glowering at the alien.

"Take me to Ash Tree," he demanded.

The Spectre nodded, as if he expected this. Which wasn't outside the realm of possibility, considering what he'd cautioned earlier.

Shepard followed the Turian out of the C-sec academy, effectively blind to his surroundings. He was consumed by his own thoughts

"You knew," Shepard accused abruptly. "You knew about all of this."

"Yeah," Garrus said with a shrug. "Your friend there had a conference with the Councillors a while back. Not important enough to make the news, but C-sec knew about it."

"You could have told me," there was a note of rebuke in the statement.

"Yes," Garrus agreed. "I could have."

"Why didn't you?" Shepard's voice was almost a low growl.

"You needed to see his state for yourself," Garrus said, unintimidated by Shepard's anger."I didn't think you'd care otherwise."

A fair enough assumption. Shepard wasn't sure that he would have been able to stop himself if Kaidan's plight hadn't come as a surprise. There had been too much hate in him to be swayed by words alone.

The two continued on for a time in silence, arriving at a large elevator around which a hub of activity teemed. They pushed their way through the throng, and waited patiently for the the elevator doors to open for them.

"There was something I wanted to ask about, though," Garrus said as the doors slid shut. "Your friend, he called you Shepard."

"It is my name."

"I thought your name was Ash Dog."

"Ash Dog is the name of our tribe," he said coldly. He didn't even think about his use of the word 'our': as painful as it would be for all of them, the tribe wasn't dead yet. It had been born from the three of them, and it could live again. "Shepard is who I am. Ash Dog is what I am."

"So why didn't you tell us your name?"

Shepard shrugged.

Because he hadn't trusted them. Because they weren't human. Because everyone he'd ever cared about was either dead or he wished they were. Because even though he had been a slave, he didn't want to forget a better time. Because he didn't care anymore.

There had been a hundred reasons not to correct them. But at the moment, there was only one that mattered.

"Because you are not Ash Dog."

She was sleeping when they arrived at the hospital she was recuperating at. Shepard's heart had skipped a beat when he saw her laying there, all manner of tubes, electrodes and medical devices wired into her. There was a quiet hum of machinery and rhythmic beep in the background, but he didn't register them. He had eyes and ears only for her.

Her face was a livid mask of blacks and blues and red lines where old bruises and lacerations were still healing. There were a row of long stitches running from her shoulder, across her collarbone down to her breast before finally disappearing beneath heavy bandages wrapped around her chest. No doubt the rest of her was similarly riddled with wounds, but the light blue hospital comforter obscured them. Shepard knew from experience that it would have taken a lot to keep Ash Tree down and out.

Kaidan hadn't been lying. She'd been hurt. Badly.

Shepard looked to her hands, and noted there were restraints on her wrists, holding them in place. There were angry red lines showing where she'd strongly resisted her confinement.

The nurse, an short Asari with light blue skin and purple flecks upon her brow, must have noticed him staring at them because she answered his unasked question.

"She tried to hurt herself when she first came to," she explained. "We've been trying to keep her sedated until her condition is well enough that she can talk to a therapist, but we have to be careful. We're unfamiliar with-"

"Thank you," Shepard interrupted, uninterested in hearing any more "Can you take her off of it for a moment? I'd like to speak to her."

"Sir? Are you certain? She's- she can be quite a handful when she's awake."

Shepard felt a twitch that might have been the beginning of a grin appear on the corner of his mouth.

A handful? A harpy, more like.

It was an amusing thought, but Shepard didn't smile at it.

"Yes," he said instead. "I know. I'd still like to speak to her."

The nurse looked uncertain, and looked to Garrus for guidance. The Turian merely nodded, which seemed to be enough for her. Shepard was aware of none of this: his attention was wholly on the sleeping woman before him.

"Very well," she said carefully, and adjusted something on her omnitool. Something chimed in the mess of machinery beside Ash Tree "But I'll be just outside if you need anything."

Ash Tree didn't wake until almost a half-hour later, her body working the drugs out of her system slowly in her condition. But when she did, she was still slow and stupid from being put under.

"Hezuhh," she mumbled sleepily, and her eyes twitched open. They blinked, slowly focusing and coming to life. Almost as quickly, the rest of her body stirred. She tried to move, but the restraints on her wrist kept her still. She fought feebly against them at first, confusion working its way onto her face, but before long she was thrashing and writhing desperately with her whole body, terror plain on her face.

Shepard was at her side before he could stop himself, concern for her well being superseding his need for answers. He pushed her down, trying to stop her from pulling her stitches and making things worse for herself.

Ash Tree snapped her eyes to glare at him hatefully for just a moment. And then her struggles ceased, replaced by shock and disbelief.

"Shepard," she whispered, her eyes blinking furiously. As if she were trying to dispel some terrible illusion. "But- you're- you're dead!"

Shepard drew back, seeing that the woman wasn't about to hurt herself anymore.

"No," he said tersely. "And neither are you."

Ash Tree looked like she was about to cry. Which would have been something Shepard would have paid to see at one point, because even now he wasn't wholly certain she was capable of it. Her mouth moved slowly, as if searching for words.

Shepard could sympathize, somewhat. He was conflicted between relief that she really was alive and a need to be angry with her.

"How?" she managed to say with a strangled voice.

"I fought," Shepard said with a shrug. "I killed them all."

"With some help, of course," Garrus chimed in.

Shepard scowled in annoyance, but didn't argue the point. If not for Garrus, the Eclipse would have had him dead to rights.

"They said they'd killed you," Ash Tree said, staring at him as if afraid he might disappear if she blinked.

"They lied," Shepard told her.

"Yes," Ash Tree nodded, closing her eyes. The water that had formed in the corner of her eyes trickled down, but she didn't cry. Not really. "Yes, they did."

She tried move her hand, but the restraints kept her still. She hissed with annoyance, then shot Shepard an imploring look.

"Would you...?"

Instead of answering her Shepard undid the strap. No sooner than he had freed one hand she used it to pull him close. Shepard was bent forward uncomfortably and his hip smashing against the side of the hospital bed painfully as Ash Tree held him in a tight embrace.

"I thought you were dead," she whispered into his ear with such elation that he couldn't help but feel it himself.

Kaidan had said they hurt her. Shepard saw that they had done so in more than one way.

"I'm here," he assured her quietly, and let himself relax.

They stayed that way for a long time, both of them merely savouring the company of the other. It was a pleasant moment where he was content to feel her, smell her, hear her shuddering breath and be content with the knowledge that she was alive. After so long of pain, loss and fury it couldn't be overstated just how good it felt when he let his spear shaft fall to the ground and wrap his arms around her.

The moment ended all too soon, however. As good as it was to have her back, Shepard still needed answers. The people who had trusted him still demanded that much of him.

He pulled back from her, which wasn't hard considering her state. Her burst of strength had been fleeting, and now she was once more a grievously wounded woman. She watched him, her expression brimming with concern.

"Kaidan told me what happened," Shepard said. "The two of you..." he trailed off.

Ash Tree eyes widened with sudden comprehension, and she had the grace to lower her gaze.

"You want to know why we betrayed you,"

"Please, I have to know. I-" His voice seized, and he had to swallow and clear his throat before continuing. "I need to know how I failed."

Ash Tree was quiet, still looking away from him.

"It wasn't your fault," she said eventually. "We- no, I thought it was the best decision. I persuaded Kaidan."

It hurt more than he thought it would to hear her admit that. It hurt enough that he wanted to look away himself, but it was only through terrible determination that he forced himself to glower at her.

"My father was right, that night in the camp," Ash Tree continued. "You would lead, or you would die gloriously."

She drew a shuddering breath.

"You would have led us to a glorious death, Shepard," she told him. "We had no food, no water. Our home was under siege."

"We could have fought them off," Shepard protested, weakly. He could begin to see what she

"And what then?" Ash Tree asked. "Who would have us? Who would defend us? You could not see, Shepard. Even now. We are small, here. We are a speck of dust in the wind. You are a magnificent warrior, but you are a terrible chief. You would have led us to war against the galaxy, and we would have been destroyed."

"So you betrayed me," Shepard accused. "You betrayed all of us. You and Kaidan. And now everyone is dead because of it."

Ash Tree didn't say anything. It was clear that she had had the same thought many times before. Kaidan as well, no doubt.

They had thought they were saving the tribe. And instead, they'd ended up almost destroying it as surely as they thought he would.

"Why didn't you come to me?" Shepard asked. "I would have listened."

Ash Tree made a sound that could almost have been a laugh, but it sounded too strangled to be such.

"Shepard, you can be called many things," she said with sad amusement. "But a great listener is not one of them. Would you really have agreed to run from the Blood Pack?"

The tribesman had to admit that he probably wouldn't have. He had been too drunk off victory and glory to be dissuaded from fighting again. Battle was never something he had shied from, no matter the difficulty. Why else would someone attack a heavily armed Krogan battlemaster with nothing but a sword, spears and whatever they could pillage in the heat of the moment? With patchwork armour, and already tired and wounded?

No, Shepard would never have listened before he had thought everything had been taken from him. He had been little more than a dog on a leash under Garm, and liberating himself by the sword had done nothing for his temperament.

He couldn't really blame Ash Tree or Kaidan for going behind his back. She was right: he had been a terrible chief. And the tribe as a whole had suffered for it.

"We never had a chance," Shepard said, more to himself than anyone else.

Ash Tree was watching him again, her eyes reddening just a little bit. She reached out for his hand and gave it a squeeze. Her thumb stroked the back of his hand, and despite the coarseness of her skin the gesture felt good.

"But some of us still survived," she said, and tried to smile. "We're still here."

"Yes," Shepard agreed. "We are, aren't we?"

So many dead... but the three of them were still alive. They had created the Ash Dogs together, and they weren't dead yet.

Shepard felt a slow smile

"And we can rise again."

AN: So yeah, that happened. A bit of a deconstruction of Shep's character, but it's merited. He's a tribal raider, dammit. At the end of the last chapter there isn't much difference between him and, say, Legate Lanius. All he wanted was to kill, maim and destroy his enemies, and everything else can hang. Hopefully I managed to portray the personality growth convincingly. If not... then I'll see what I can do.

There was an attempt to make the whole "noble savage" thing more apparent, hopefully you've picked up on it. If not, then it at least adds character. That term is usually meant to refer to spirituality, specifically man's connection to nature. But that's filthy hippy talk, so in this instance it refers to society itself. Because let's be honest: if you have enough time to read fanfiction of a crossover, (let alone write the stuff,) you probably aren't prepared for the day society collapses in on itself. (Not that it will. But if it does, I know that I'm gonna be boned.) Think of the millions, nay billions of people who simply cannot fend for themselves. You don't need Deathclaws, zombies or robots for all those people to die: a hard winter would probably do the trick right quick. But one of the easiest ways to counteract that? Community. As Joshua Graham says in the game: "When the walls come tumbling down, when you lose everything you have, you always have family. And your family always has tribe."

'Course, once the community gets large enough and strong enough people begin to specialize, and then the monkeysphere appears, and then France pops into existence and then all sorts of weird shit starts happening and then I get born and then the apocalypse happens and suddenly I'm fighting old people at the supermarket for the last can of tuna because I don't know how to live in a world without money!

… Sorry, I think I got off track there. Shepard was right in that sweet spot where everyone knows and depends on one another for help, but still not numerous enough to start the foundations for civilization. And seeing a society almost wholly based in the tertiary sector of the economy as a opposed to the primary that he's used to is something of a culture shock. That, and so much excess. (Imagine someone from, say, one of the hunter-gatherer societies of Africa being dropped in a supermarket.)

In keeping with the trend of Shep sort of trending after famous characters, we now have him gaining wisdom after losing an eye. Sort of like a certain popular Nordic god of war: Odin. Funnily enough, he's also associated with the famed berserkers, who were often considered to be Odin's special warriors and whom Shepard showed some. Sooo... yeah. Power of coincidence!

I seriously debated just leaving Ashley dead. Really, it was the original plan. But she'll be relevant later.

Next chapter should be out quick and fast, as it's really just a single scene in the aftermath of ME2. It seems like everyone just scattered to the four winds after that game, so Shep gets to do the same... More on that later!

Lastly, Shepard wears lady pants. And looks like a lady. (Or an alien species composed solely of ladies, rather. So basically the same thing.) And he flaunts his chest like he's a drunken sorority girl at mardi gras. Because real men... are ladies. Heh.

Now, give me your words, your favs, your praise! And for the love of gods, WHORE ME! WHHOOOOOOOOORE!

(Also, if anyone happens to spot a good pic they think would work as a cover for this fic? Do share with the rest of the class. Because it's something that I've been trying to work out for a while, and nothing really works.)