April 27, 2169 - The Citadel Presidium

It was a bad Saturday for Sigren Shepard. Her mother, Major Hannah Shepard, Chief of staff to the Systems Alliances' naval attaché to the Citadel Council had been surprised by being told to attend meetings all day. The unfortunate change in Hannah Shepard's schedule meant that their plans to go to the rapidly growing colony at Bekenstein had to be cancelled. Most of Sigren's little circle of friends from the small mostly Human prep school she attended on the Kithoi ward were busy; those who weren't had come down with a nasty reaction to something that had been served for lunch the day before.

With nothing to do after her morning run around the presidium Sigren decided to sit on a bench near the Consort's famous establishment in hopes she would see someone interesting either entering or leaving that most mysterious of places.

Little could Sigren know the profound impact on her life and that of Sha'ira's most prized acolyte this choice would have. She also couldn't foresee that she would become the subject of more reports from the duct rats who usually watched the Consorts front door to the Shadow Broker and other interested parties than anyone else in Council Space. Even if she had foreseen everything that would happen, Sigren would soon say and repeat many times, that she would not have done anything different if faced with the choices she would take over the next few minutes.

The first inkling of something going wrong was a sudden sharp explosion some few hundred meters away. Sigren didn't choose to run toward the noise. She knew that being caught investigating the blast would ensure that her mother would double her PT for at least a month.

Apparently most of the beings nearby didn't have mothers who believed that a month of thrice-weekly 20 kilometre runs alternating with two hours of daily calisthenics were an appropriate punishment for throwing oneself into potential danger. Although many did run away from the blast area itself, most crowded inward to see what happened.

More small explosions soon followed and the citadel sky was lit by the glow of fireworks.

The rapidly growing tangle of hundreds of curious beings a short distance from Sigren drew the attention of a number of C-SEC officers, who began doing their best to chivvy people toward the wards and away from the light show. By distracting the officers the masses of citadel denizens kept them from seeing an air-taxi drop right in front of the steps leading to the Consort's front door. Sigren, however, did see the car and more importantly, the pair of heavily armed Batarians inside it.

In spite of her best attempts to quietly draw the attention of the nearby C-SEC officers to what was happening behind them, none of the officers paid attention to the tall, unusually fit, fifteen year old Human who instinctively understood that making a scene could be more dangerous than doing nothing.

Moments after their arrival at Sha'ira's front door, the most beautiful Asari Sigren had ever seen came walking up the path from the Presidium gardens, diaphanous robes fluttering around her.

It wasn't immediately apparent to Sigren that the incredibly graceful Asari was the Batarians' target. Only after the heavily muscled driver got out of the car, solid-looking club in hand, did she realize that whoever the beautiful oxford-blue Asari was, there was extreme danger for her here.

Sigren knew instinctively that if she raised the alarm too quickly, the Batarians would claim she was falsely accusing them of bad intensions. Waiting too long meant they would likely be successful in harming the gorgeous Asari before C-SEC could do anything to stop them. If Sigren tried to stop them, there was every risk she would share the fate of the stunning Asari who gave every indication of unknowingly walking into what looked like a very dangerous trap.

Sigren had been taught that bad people only succeeded in evil when good ones didn't do anything to stop them. She had no choice but to act.

Knowing the hand-to-hand combat training she had received since she was five years old would probably give her a momentary edge over kidnappers who wouldn't expect a young Human girl to have potentially deadly moves and be ready to use them, Sigren rose quickly, hastening toward some of the topiaries that decorated this section of the Citadel common. Hopefully the greenery would give her the cover she needed to get close enough to throw a wrench in the Batarians' plans.

The marine trainers her mother had gotten to sharpen Sigren's skills had told many a story about how time does crazy things when getting ready for a fight. Sigren had never believed them until today.

Knowing that using it was a long shot, she activated the silent alarm on her Omni tool in hopes that it might notify her mother in time for her to get help. By the time that was done and she had moved from her bench to the first bit of cover, the Batarian was only yards away from his helpless prey.

With three bushes, and seemingly hours of crawling, to go before she could intervened directly, Sigren quickly realized her only way forward was to forget stealth and simply lower her shoulder in hopes of catching the enemy off guard.

With luck she'd be able to grab the heavy handgun sitting all-too-temptingly on his lower back. If she could get that at least she could put a shot into the asshole still sitting in the passenger seat of the taxi and draw attention from Sha'ira's staff to help Sigren and the Asari dressed as a Consort's acolyte as well.

Sigren knew from things her mother had said over the dinner table that the Consort took safety seriously but that she trusted C-SEC with external security. With C-SEC distracted, there was no hope for either Sigren or her potential co-victim without help from inside Sha'ira's facilities.

So, her job in the next fifteen seconds, other than putting down at least one Batarian, would be to make enough noise to get the attention of Sha'ira's commando-trained Asari guards who would be more than able to handle a couple of assholes out to kidnap one of the acolytes they were sworn to protect.

That thought in mind, Sigren uncurled like a deadly spring, literally leaping over the bush behind which she had been hiding. While normally her 182cm height would have been an embarrassment to the fifteen year-old girl, today it was a gift from the gods.

Sigren's long strides quickly brought her to the Batarian who had just raised his club in preparation for a knock-out blow.

Just as he swung, the slim-yet-curvy Asari seemed to realize her danger, desperately ducking in hopes of evading the blow. It was obvious, even to Sigren, that although the Asari with the huge silver eyes might be one of the consort's acolytes, she didn't have any self-defence training at all.

Sigren, on the other hand, did have such training. Her two-handed chop on the back of the Batarian's partially protected neck succeeded not only in minimizing the injuries the Asari would otherwise have taken but also stunned him just long enough for Sigren to grab his heavy pistol, spin and make a flurry of off-hand shots toward his car-bound companion. Sigren was just able to see that at least one of her bullets caused her target's skull to explode, putting him out of the action…permanently.

Only after a brief moment of pleasure at her successful takedown did Sigren realize that her right hand and wrist were likely broken by their impact on the Batarian's armoured collar. This was a problem in two respects. First, she was right-handed. Second, her target now knew well that she was there and he was on her right side, making her far less able to defend herself against his forthcoming counter-strike.

The mechanically enhanced blow, when it came, caught her in the ribs, likely fracturing a couple of them.

Grunting with the pain and more than a bit of surprise Shepard spun around, hoping to use the Batarian's pistol as an ersatz club.

Unfortunately, with the pistol in her left hand, the blow lost much of its potential force.

The one positive that came from the move was a glimpse of the slender Asari running to safety through the consort's front door.

The next thing Sigren knew she had an angry Batarian wrenching her broken wrist up behind her back and a knee pile-driving into her kidneys.

The pain was incredible.

"Fucking little Human cunt!" he roared, barely audible over her anguished scream.

"You just cost me five million credits and I'm going to take every single one of them out of you."

"Screw you," she grunted, struggling to relieve the pain in a wrist that was going from broken to shattered as her captor twisted it fiercely.

"Yes," the Batarian snarled….The rest of your life that's exactly what you're gonna do….every minute, every hour….every day….every week…." He said, wrenching her wrist just that little bit more.

"Not fucking likely," she grunted, whipping her free hand up and clawing it into his unprotected face.

"Oh, I think it's very likely," he grunted, avoiding her fingers by smashing his head into her left ear.

"Actually," a sharp voice said from nearby, "I think you would be well to release the young Human."

The Batarian jerked in surprise and Sigren, recognizing an opportunity when she saw one, smashed her head back against his shoulder, twisting ferociously in hopes of a quick escape.

She almost succeeded but his grip on her rapidly fragmenting wrist was just enough to keep her from fully breaking away from him.

However, before he rewrapped his arm around her waist, she was able to see that at least half a dozen Asari commandos were standing in a loose ring around them.

"Fuck!" snarled the Batarian, twisting Sigren's wrist violently.

The pain from this latest insult was so intense that Sigren nearly lost consciousness.

When she fully came back to herself, she realized with horror that although he'd let her wrist go, he now held the club-like weapon she'd seen him preparing to use on the Asari she had rescued.

The weapon she had thought was a club was actually a high-output Batarian stun baton now hanging, ready for use, only inches from her unprotected face.

Sigren had been shown a wide variety of alien weapons in preparing for her family's transfer to the Citadel. She knew that had she been free to do so, the best thing to do when faced with one of these horrific weapons was to run like hell.

The device in question was used by Batarian guards to torture slaves, its output more than sufficient to leave permanent burn scars after the first use if the injuries weren't treated right away.

"You failed in kidnapping acolyte Sithana," the lead commando said quietly. "There is no benefit to anyone in causing further injury to the Human."

"Pain to non-Batarians is always a benefit," Sigren's captor snarled. "Hurting Humans is just that extra bit sweeter."

With that, he activated the baton and drove it into Sigren's face. The blue-white sparks the weapon generated were the last thing she would see with her own eyes for many months.

A/N Re: this chapter, for the purposes of visualization, Sigren is a young Taylor Ritzel (US rowing) with appropriate changes in hair and eye color. At this stage of the story, Sithana is played by Katie Holmes.