Prologue - Dreams of Before

"Deep is the well of the past.
Should one not call it unfathomable?"
- Thomas Mann.

2170 - Mindoir Colony.

The stars glittered high in the night sky, and John swept his arms as if to take them all in. "I'm going to go there, one day." he said to his companion, pointing out one of the thousands of stars he could see. "I'm going to go to Earth, and Mars, and the Citadel!"

"Lie down, John." replied the soft voice of his companion, "You always get so excited about the stars and-" She imitated his voice, "-'far off distant worlds'. Isn't life here good enough?"

John shook his head, "You know that's not what I mean." But he came back and reclined on the blanket they shared. It wasn't that John disliked Mindoir, it was his home after all, but the stars held such appeal. Mindoir was just a frontier world on the border of the space controlled by humanity's System Alliance, settled in the almost frantic gold rush for habitable worlds. "Look, one day, you just tell me where you want to go - and we will go."

"Right now?"

John was silent for a few moments. He smiled. "Maybe not right now. When I'm eighteen, maybe. That's, like, two years from now."

"Bring your head back down here and out of the stars. Come back to me." The night air ruffled her golden hair, and John swore it could have been a halo for a few moments. She was an angel, at least to him.

John just sighed. "Alright." The two of them lay side by side, just enjoying their moment under the stars. The day had been long and stressful, but now everything was perfect. A perfect night, a perfect girl. A farming colony like Mindoir was a lot of hard work, but she made it all worth it. He could just lay here forever. His reverie was broken by the noise of a few small starships streaking towards the colony.

John's companion traced her hand along his arm, "And whose ships are those, my captain?"

He sat up to get a better view of the ships, liking the sound of the word 'captain'. One day... He couldn't really recognise their type. "I don't know. Supply ships, I guess. I heard that they were running late." In the dark, they were illuminated only by the light of Mindoir's moon and their own running lights. They seemed to be landing... all around the colony. It was almost like they were setting up a perimeter.

"Those aren't supply ships." replied John, and he suddenly felt very cold. "Come on, we should head back..."

They were halfway there when one of the landed ships exploded violently. The sound sent adrenaline roaring through John's veins. In the distance, he could hear faint gunshots.

"Come on!" shouted John, taking his companion's hand, "Let's go! We can't get caught outside! People will be grouping in the square!"

They ran. As they closed, John could see the few members of Mindoir's colonial defence force attempting to stem the tide of the invaders. They were scattered, unprepared. The chattering of assault rifles seemed to be all he could hear.

John knew his way around the colony, he'd lived there his entire life, and he sped towards the central square, passing defence force soldiers who were heading towards the sounds of battle, past civilians who were fleeing towards any form of shelter. They were all screaming.

"Where is the Alliance? Where are the Marines?"
"Hold them here! Hold them here!"
"Take cover! Get the women and children away from here!"
"It can't be the Batarians! They wouldn't risk a war with the Citadel!"

John had heard about the Batarians, he had read about them in history class. A race known mainly for their slavers and pirates and their isolationist policies. From what John could remember of his classes, the Batarians had disputed much of humanity's claim to many systems inside an area of space known as the Skyllian Verge. Habitable worlds were hard to find, and the Systems Alliance was directly competing with the Batarian species. In the end, the Council had refused to intervene on the Batarian's behalf and, in response, the Batarians had withdrawn themselves from Citadel space.

Since then they had never liked humans.

Something occurred to him suddenly. The square wasn't safe. There was only one thing the Batarians could want in this raid. "We need to get out of the square!" he turned to "They're herding us! They're slavers!"

"Don't say that..." whimpered his companion.

John squeezed her hand, "We'll make it. We'll get to my place and we'll lock ourselves in. There's guns there. Just don't look back."

The Batarians who had made it to the centre of the colony were pressing their attack, gunning down all who resisted and grabbing those who didn't. People were scattering every which way, and it was only making it easier for the aliens to subdue them. Everyone was screaming, yelling, crying. Every so often John could hear a harsh crack as the slavers stunned their opponents into submission. Others weren't so lucky and the Batarians broke bones to make their targets more compliant.

But John knew where his house was from here, and he knew that his family kept some small arms as a precaution. If he could just make it there, he'd figure out what to do. A fighting chance was better than none, that's what his dad always said. His father... would probably be out fighting the Batarians. Hell, his mother would be to, probably.

John's legs and arms were pumping with an energy borne from fear and adrenaline. A light flared, he felt heat on his back. His house was close now.

John thundered through the front door, almost tripping over a chair that had been cast aside in a rush. Maybe his father or mother had been sitting in it when the attack came. He scrabbled for the box his father always stored the weapons in. It'd already been opened, and his father's shotgun was missing. The only weapon in there was a pistol, but John had fired it before and he knew he could do so again. John took the pistol in his right hand, feeling the weapon unfold and extend to its full size, noting the status indicators on the gun switching from inactive to ready. John turned to tell his companion to hide-

She wasn't with him.

John didn't even have time to mourn as, at that moment, a figure lurched through the doorway. The figure seemed human enough, bipedal at least. However, the head wasn't. The too-narrow head bobbed on its long sinewy neck for a moment, and then looked over to thing that really drew John's attention was the fact that it had four jet black eyes, two distinct sets, one above the other. And all four eyes were focused directly on him. The figure - it had to be a Batarian - lowered its weapon and took a step forward, and John knew that the alien probably wanted to take him alive. To become a slave.

John squeezed the trigger. A grain of sand accelerated to an incredible velocity took the Batarian right in the chest, the alien glowed brightly for a moment but only the fact that he stumbled let John know he had been hit at all.

A kinetic barrier. John had heard about those from some Alliance marines who had been stopping over on patrol. He pulled the trigger in quick succession, keeping the Batarian unbalanced and hopefully depleting the alien's shields. After about half a dozen shots, the Batarian's chest and back erupted in a spray of gore and fragments of combat armor. The next two shots ensured that the alien went down, and stayed down.

John went down too, slumping to the ground. He felt tears. She was gone, and there was nowhere to go and nothing he could do. All he could do was wait and hope to take out as many Batarians as he could.

There was one problem, however. His pistol had overheated, and its automatic systems and heat sinks would need several moments to cool down before he could fire it again. Several moments is all a Batarian would need to find him and kill him, or capture him. The gunfire and sounds of battle were getting closer by the moment. Regardless, he'd make the next Batarian he saw pay for all of this.

It didn't take long. A figure entered John's house, assault rifle up and sweeping the room. They were clad in grey combat armor, wearing a helmet that obscured three quarters of their face. They looked once at the dead Batarian, and then to John.

They were human. John kept his weapon up. He hadn't seen any humans in the attacking force, but that didn't mean there weren't any.

"Whoa, son," replied the marine, "Relax. I'm Alliance military, Lieutenant Ernesto Zabaleta, SSV Einstein. We got here as fast as we could. We've got the bastards on the run. Are you alright?"

John watched him for a moment and finally lowered his pistol. "You're not a Batarian." was all he could think to say.

The marine smiled, "Not a Batarian? I'll take that as a compliment. Just sit tight, son, we'll have everything sorted out soon enough."

John just stood, and lurched towards the doorway. "Son..." repeated Zabaleta, his voice had a warning tone.

"You've got a ship, right?" said John, "We can go after them and... we can save- Oh God."

The colony of Mindoir no longer existed. The buildings lay broken and burning, obscuring the stars with thick black ash, bodies - human and batarian - lay broken in the streets. "Oh God." was all John could say, and he dropped to his knees, leaned fowards, and puked his guts out. Then a second time, and a third, until all he had were dry heaves. He tried to stand, but couldn't. His head spun and it felt like something had sucked all the blood out of his brain. It couldn't have happened.

Zabaleta placed one of his hands on John's shoulder, "I'm sorry."

John Shepard just remained on his knees, staring out at the broken remains of his entire life. He remained that way for a very long time.