IMPORTANT NOTE: If you're wondering why there's suddenly more chapters to this story, it's because I decided to re-upload it as individual chapters (as opposed to one gigantic uber-chapter). If you've already read this story, no need to continue (unless you found it so awesome you wanted to re-read it), I haven't changed/added any content.
Part 1, Chapter 1, Soldier:
The more things change, the more they stay the same. Captain Victoria Shepard surveyed the Citadel Presidium from the balcony of the Alliance Embassy. Utter devastation, that's what came to mind when she thought about the Reaper War. The Citadel had faired very well, but that wasn't saying much.
War was fickle. Millions had died in the wards. C-SEC hadn't been able to get the Citadel buttoned up quickly enough when the hammer-blow fell. Strangely, here there was no damage. In days past she would have been incensed. The Council denies the existence of the Reapers, does nothing to prepare for their arrival, even actively hinders her efforts to stop them, and they survive where the millions they were nominally supposed to serve died in their homes. Now she was just too numb. Them's the breaks.
Captain Shepard launched into an introspective exercise. Did she not care because the sheer magnitude of the disaster, literally on a galactic scale, was beyond human comprehension? Or was she just a flawed person? The Councilor striding up behind her broke the trance.
"Captain. Good to see you."
Shepard turned to look at Councilor Anderson, "Thank you sir, you're looking well yourself." Like the rest of the Council, Anderson had come through the War, at least the Citadel's corner of it, unscathed. It's good to see you made it friend, Victoria thought to herself, some good people needed to make it through.
"Are you ready Captain?" Anderson pointed the way. Shepard nodded and followed. This is going to be interesting.
Truly, Captain Shepard really didn't know what was coming next. It's not like they can do any worse than the Reapers, she chuckled internally. Would they send her on a 'victory tour', trying to convince Citadel Space that all was well, as the Destiny Ascension did after the First Battle of the Citadel? Would she be sent back out into the fray to help pick up the pieces? There were already some rumblings of rebellion in outlying systems. How could you blame them? After all, it's not like the Council did anything to help them. Maybe they'll give me a medal and a vacation.
Indeed, that's what Shepard hoped for. She thought back to the night she killed the Shadow Broker. Shepard smiled to herself at the memory. She'd all but proposed to Liara T'soni then and there, promising her a herd of blue babies, maybe even a white picket fence, but she had decided to wait until the Reaper threat was dealt with. Her smile widened when she thought of what came next. All of the pent up stress and adrenaline from the fight with the Broker, even stretching back to the shootout with Vasir, had erupted in a glorious evening of frenetic love-making in her stateroom on Normandy. Shepard's heart picked up its pace just thinking about it.
Well, you faced down a hyper-race of sentient starships bent on galactic genocide; you can face down a handful of politicians.
The door to the council chambers opened.