& application

[inspectre]

PLAYER:
Name & DW Journal: Kiwi Fruit / flyingmechanical
Birthdate & Age: February 12th, 1990 / 22.
Characters played in Zodion: Harry Flynn, Leonardo da Vinci, Kadar Al-Sayf, Subaru Sumeragi, Hal Emmerich

CHARACTER:
Name: Commander John Shepard.
Canon: Mass Effect.
PB/Image:
Default Male Shepard.
Info links:
Commander Shepard, Mass Effect, Mass Effect 2, Mass Effect 3.

Since Commander Shepard is a variable silent protagonist, I'll also be doing a brief outline on Shepard's characterization. Shepard has the choice between being Paragon and Renegade in all conversations and Neutral options, and my Shepard leans heavily towards the Paragon dialogue options, with some marked exceptions that will be noted here and within his personality. I felt it was also necessary to lay out the choices that he made and how they affected everything, since Mass Effect is such a variable game and there's a lot of possible deaths that can happen or be avoided. (As a note, Jeep, Killi, Justine and I purposefully did not completely line up our character's universes, so there will be a fair degree of variation between all of them, particularly in regards to romance, as I've purposefully kept Shepard completely romance free for this history.)

Shepard is the default Earthborn, Sole Survivor profile. In the first game, he easily accepted Captain Anderson's recommendation for him to become a Spectre and threw himself into fighting against Saren, though he was a little unsure on telling the Council about his vision. He's promoted to Spectre, then goes off to save Liara T'Soni in a fairly efficient manner before bopping down to Noveria, where Shepard refuses to put his weapons down and nearly starts a gunfight (little more Renegade on that end-- stubborn to the end). The important decision here is on the subject of Matriarch Benezia, who is possessed and Shepard has to kill her. He lets the Rachni Queen go, however, on the promise that she won't harm anyone again. On Feros, Shepard makes an effort to help all the Colonists before launching into saving everything, which later includes the Colonists. He gets the Prothean knowledge from Shiala and lets her live.

On Virmire is where a lot of Important Things happen, and a fair few decisions. Shepard first convinces Wrex to work with them, even at the cost of the genophage, and then later, allows the unindoctrinated Imness to go free-- but he does not release the indoctrinated members of Imness's group, since he knows and has seen what Indoctrination can do to people, thus choosing a more neutral option, but listening to the urges of his teammates. He lets Rana go free, and then when hard choices have to be made, he sacrifices Ashley.

Shepard lets Anderson decide for himself how to help them steal the Normady, continues on, talks Saren into redemption (which causes Saren to consequently kill himself), saves the Council and the Destiny Ascension, and then kills the undead Saren.

In the second game, nothing terribly important happens for awhile -- go on, recruit squadmembers, and so on. Shepard pretty much makes nothing but paragon decisions (with occasional renegade snark in dialogue) and has a touching reunion with Kaidan wherein he briefly tries to convince him to join him working for Cerberus. It doesn't go over well. He saves the dying Salarian later on, on Thane's mission, gets all the information from Nassana, strokes Pitne For's ego, and basically continues to make nothing but Paragon decisions, because even when working for Cerberus, Shepard makes an effort to be as good to everyone as he can. Shepard does reactive and recruit Legion, and by the time the Collector's pop up to swarm the ship, he'd completed all the loyalty missions and recruited all of his crewmembers, including Kasumi and Zaeed. It should be noted that for Garrus's loyalty mission, Shepard did warn Sidonis and did not allow Garrus to take the shot, and for Legion's loyalty mission, he killed the heretics. He stopped Miranda from shooting her father, he saved Samara (not Morinth), and he secured Tali's exoneration without presenting the evidence of her innocence.

When jumping to the Omega 4 relay, Shepard did not delay at all, thus getting there in time to save Kelly Chambers and everyone else. He also was certain to purchase all the necessary upgrades to make sure nothing in the Normandy went wrong and killed his crew. No one died on the entire suicide rush, and he sent all the ideal people on the appropriate parts of the mission to ensure survival. Shepard chooses the paragon (and obvious!) action of destroying the Collector facility, thus pissing off the Illusive Man.

With that, we roll swiftly into the third game! We roll into Shepard almost immediately into battle in the middle of Vancouver, with reapers trying to murder everyone. He kicks off the game with nothing but Paragon conversations, including an important conversation with the Illusive Man as he tries to persuade him to follow Shepard's line of thinking. Kaidan, as the survivor from Virmire, is the one who nearly gets his head kicked in by Eva, and Shepard therefore consistently visits and talks with him, slowly convincing him of Shepard's loyalty to the Alliance. Shepard recuits Dr. Michel and asked Dr. Chakwas to stay behind, and also gains Khalisah and Diana Allers as war assets. Despite the amount of times the Council has dicked him over (the number is somewhere around 16, I think), Shepard remains positive to them, in large part because he needs them.

For Palaven, Shepard continued being diplomatic and Paragon to the turians, having every intention of gaining their help. On Sur'kesh, Shepard does his best to act in the interest of all races and attempts to help the Krogan without actively burning his bridges with the Salarians. Shepard saved the female krogan and Mordin made it out safely. On Tuchanka, Shepard chose to leave the rachni abomination to die rather than have it lash out again, choosing to keep the krogan as a more powerful war asset. Later, Shepard helped cure the genophage, losing Mordin in the process, but saving Eve, and ensuring the future of the krogan race.

Back on the Citadel, Thane takes a hit and dies instead of the councilor so that she can live, because this game feeds off of tears. He successfully convinces Kaidan that Udina is the enemy, so Kaidan shot Udina. Shepard finally manages to recruit Kaidan a little while later, securing his loyalty. Later, Shepard finds Legion imprisoned, and so begins to work to rescue him, and when they return to the Normandy, Shepard promptly makes sure that the Quarians know they are not allowed to disassemble him. Shepard does help EDI and Joker hook up, despite having something of a personal no-romance attitude. He also allows Miranda Alliance support and warns her about Kai Leng. Shepard trusts Legion after talking a walk through memory data banks. Shepard also chose to Admiral Koris over the civilians, and doing so helped Shepard negotiate peace between the Geth and the Quarians, ending a long, long war. Shepard helps convince Miranda's father not to kill her sister, and uses the information gathered from her to go take down Cerberus. It should be noted that Shepard also completed all the "side missions", such as the Grissom Academy investigation and the Ardat-Yakshi Monastery.

And then: the endgame. Shepard keeps all his teammates from dying on Earth, as well as saving Anderson by convincing the Illusive Man that he's been indoctrinated, causing the Illusive Man to promptly kill himself. Shepard also saved Earth, and the galaxy.

In the end, Shepard chooses the synthesis ending path, of the options he has— I feel this is the ending that supports his ideals throughout the majority of the game. His fierce loyalty to his people would not allow him to sacrifice EDI or the Geth for the sake of the Destroy ending, and knowing that the reapers were effectively being controlled the same as the husks would make him want to allow them freedom in the same way he wants to allow most people to be free, which means he wouldn't want to go for Control, either. Synthesis presents an opportunity for further development for all races, as well as a brighter, more united future— something Shepard had been working towards for the majority of the game. (The other ending, refusal, is definitely something Shepard would not bother with at all, because his life is not a Linkin Park song and he has not come so far to have nothing even matter. He is going to save the galaxy, dammit, even if it means he will die doing so.)

So, to sum up: Shepard is very, very, very heavily leaning towards Paragon, with occasional bits of Renegade that's mostly kept into his thought processes (but occasionally bleeds out into commentary, headbutting Krogan, and so on) and he occasionally makes neutral decisions, when it's more beneficial-- usually to keep from alienating someone.

Canon Point:
Post-3; Synthesis Ending.
Gender & Sex:
Male.
Age: Technically, 32. He died at the end of the second game, and was slowly resurrected (by science!) over the course of two years, so he's mentally 30, however.
Birthdate/Sign: April 11th; Aries. Canon.
Tattoo: On his right shoulder blade, an inch or so high.
Suitability: N/A.
Power: Commander Shepard is, when we first meet him— a good soldier, and that's a trend that continues itself throughout the entire game. He's picked out of all the other members of the Alliance to be a potential candidate for the first human Spectre, which does quite a bit to speak for his talents and dedications. Prior to the beginning of the game, he was on a mission that went somewhat sour, and he proved both his tenacity and his ability to work through some nasty survivor's guilt when he was the sole survivor of the mission. He managed to get over it (in as much as anyone can ever overcome trauma), and it added to his personality in a decent run of positive ways.

He is fiercely loyal. Not necessarily to the Alliance, as we see over the course of the games (he takes a long detour to ostensibly work for Cerberus during the events of the second game), but more to specific people. He is loyal to Captain Anderson; he is loyal to the people under his command. He does not confuse gratitude with loyalty- certainly, he's grateful to Cerberus for bringing him back from the dead, but he isn't as loyal to them. He is loyal to Miranda, as a friend and a comrade, because she proves herself as more than simply Cerberus, in the way that most members of the crew prove themselves as his ally, more than simply hands of the Alliance, sticking with both he and the Normandy. Shepard is not the sort to simply throw this loyalty away, valuing it. It's said that part of Shepard's appeal to the Council is his ability to inspire this loyalty in people, and he values it, which is why he aims to return it.

Shepard is the sort of person that you don't want to try to out-stubborn. On the bright side, you can call it determination, but if you're the one fighting him? It's probably a lot more like sheer bullheaded behavior. Shepard won't listen to pretty words if he's already made up his mind: he is going to do exactly what he set out to do, with very rare exceptions. If it turns out he was wrong, well, he'll admit that straight up, and then approach fixing the problem with the same amount of determination. This determination also extends to his ability to overcome any sort of normal sane physical limitations. Killing him is a bit like trying to kill a cockroach with radiation— you can do it, but it's going to take a lot longer than it has any right to. Shepard is the sole survivor of the off-screen beginning mission, he nearly dies in the first game but comes through with nothing worse than an injured arm, he is simultaneously suffocated and melted upon re-entry to atmosphere and then brought back from the dead in the second game, and in the third game he is slightly blown up and bleeding out and still doesn't die until he's actually disintegrated. This inability to actually die is represented in his strength, as well; he's one of the few (if not the only) L3 implant biotic that will routinely spike higher than Kaidan Alenko's more powerful L2 implants. He's a strong shot in battle, he single-handedly takes down a reaper ship head on, he headbutts a Krogan to make a point, and he's also quite well muscled.

Continuing in the vein of "traits that make a good soldier", Shepard is also extremely hardworking. It can be a bane as much as a boon, unfortunately— he's shown in the third game to be consistently going over things even when the plans are set in stone and everyone has their orders and there's nothing more to do. He's unwilling to stop, in part because it's his job, and in part simply because it's what he believes is the right thing to do.

Shepard has a strong moral compass. He does have thoughts that err towards the side of "renegade", of course, and he does occasionally act upon them, but by and large, he keeps to his beliefs. He follows orders, not because they are from people who are capable of giving orders, but because they are from people he respects and is loyal to. He aims to save as many people as he can, and if there's a way to negotiate a situation without any causalities, he's going to take it. With that in mind, there are a few situations in which he will make decisions that are a little harder. He works with Cerberus (on the surface, anyway) for the majority of the second game; he breaks a prisoner out of a prisoner ship simply because they might be capable of helping him (and then promptly destroys the prison ship, so that the corrupt owner will stop using physical beatings as a means of control and also wouldn't arrest and sell off Shepard himself). He doesn't accept bribes, even for things as elaborate as bringing him back from the dead. He listens to Cerberus momentarily, but as soon as he realizes that they're a corrupt and flawed organization, he works towards his own agenda, instead: saving as many people as he can from the reapers.

Shepard is intelligent, for all that he might look at a glance like basic military brawn. He's made a Spectre quickly in the first game, and he then starts in on a career of finding scraps of information, putting them together, and using them to save the entire galaxy. He isn't afraid to look for information in places that might be a little unorthodox— from the mouths of criminals, rumors from strippers, in the middle of a gang fight, and all sorts of other ways. He makes sure to weed out lies as best he can by backing up what information he can, but when it's not possible, he does go with his best instinct. He'll consider all of his options before coming to a decision, particularly a weighty one, and he does consider the opinions of others that he trusts. When deciding whether to accept the ability to become a Spectre, he listens to Captain Anderson; he listens to Joker and EDI on a variety of decisions relating to the Normandy. In many ways, what helps his intelligence is that he knows he is not as intelligent as other people may be, particularly those who have expertise in areas he does not. He then simply draws many different experts together into one cohesive team, making certain to listen to all of them.

That's part of why he is more than a good soldier— he's a good Commander. He cares deeply for his crew, putting a high level of trust into them and getting a high level of loyalty in return. Despite being in Command of an Alliance vessel, he brings together a crew with a few alien experts in the first game— Wrex, a Krogan, from a race frequently looked on as nothing but mercenaries; Garrus, a Turian weapons expert who basically amounts to an ex-cop; and Tali, a Quarian, a race frequently known for their insular behavior and looked down on by many other races in the galaxy, brought on board for her information skills and her ingenious ability with tech. This continues into the second game, where he acquires a Salarian, a criminal/child science experiment by Cerberus, a Drell, and so on. He has the ability to unite all sorts of people from different backgrounds, many of whom don't agree with each other— or who outright dislike each other. He makes it clear that he won't tolerate prejudice or in-fighting amongst his crew, and he's the mediator of more than one argument on the Normandy. He's dedicated to his crew for more than just the fact that they're his crew; he's dedicated to them all as individuals, and more than that— as friends.

This ties in heavily to the fact that Shepard is a fairly social creature. He can be highly flirtatious, even in serious situations. He makes an effort to keep the spirits of his friends and crew mates up, frequently engaging in personal discussion with them. He likes to learn about everyone under his command just as much as people that he may only see once and never again. He's a very loving person, as well— though he declined all relationships in this path, he did it not for lack of interest, but because he didn't want to distract himself from the mission and let someone get hurt because of it, nor did he want to start in on a relationship when his survival was, in all honesty, highly unlikely. He's supportive, even though he does make an effort to keep himself at something of a distance. He makes every effort to answer questions about himself, just as everyone answers questions he asks, but even then, he doesn't speak that often of his childhood or the period of time before he joined the Alliance at the age of 18.

Shepard has a goal. It's not exactly a goal that's easy to achieve, and it's not a goal most people would want to take on, but he's willing to do it. His goal? To save the entire galaxy from the threat of the reapers. Sure, it sounds pretty normal, but he takes every loss on a deep and personal level, even having reoccurring nightmares of all the people he's failed to save. It's hard to save the galaxy, but he intends on doing it anyway, no matter how hard it is or how much effort it takes. He'll even take the people around him into battle, knowing that they might all die. The end of the second game is a glorified suicide mission that Shepard takes everyone into, knowing it's likely they won't all make it out— but he does it for the good of the galaxy.

Of course, Shepard wouldn't be able to do any of this if it wasn't for how charismatic he is. He naturally has a way with people and words, and his speeches tend to be motivational and rousing exactly when they need to be. Few others could collect such a group of aliens and opposites and make it work, but Commander Shepard does. More than simply inspiring people to join him, he inspires a deep loyalty that makes them follow him into a suicide mission even when they don't actually care about the galaxy— they just care about him.

A large part of Shepard's characterization comes into play in his relationships, both romantic and otherwise. While Shepard did not engage in any romantic relationships for the path I'm pulling him from, his actions within them are still important. He constantly displays a high level of empathy, caring deeply for his companions and his lovers. He is virtually completely bisexual, showing interest in a number of females as well as males, along with a few aliens (largely the Asari, a monogendered species that presents as resembling a human female), and he seems to engage in relationships based very much on individual behavior rather than gender or species. He tends to let himself be pursued, rather than doing a whole lot of pursuing, choosing something of a passive role and highly prioritizing his lover's level of comfort over his own desires. This isn't to say that he won't chase, or be a relentless flirt— he will, but when something is serious? That's a bit of a different ball game.

It's hard to make Shepard lose his temper, but it is something that will happen. While he would generally rather settle arguments peacefully, he's not above pulling out a gun and shooting someone in the face for the greater good, nor is he above launching into a clipped tirade at irritating reporters. He doesn't simply lash out in anger, however— it's always calculated to get a result, and he doesn't allow himself to be uncontrolled and angry for simple, selfish reasons. He won't simply punch someone for annoying him, no matter how much he'd like to, and he won't kill someone simply because it's more convenient that way.

Despite all the references to how much of a good soldier Shepard is, he also has his weak points— namely, the fact that he's rather willing to bend some rules and allegiances when he sees it as necessary. If working for Cerberus allowed him to gather information and the ability to defeat the reapers when the Council denied their existence, well, then, he'd work for Cerberus. He won't run away from the consequences of his actions, though, no matter how irritated the constant bureaucracy might make him. When he's detained in the beginning of the third game, he's angry with the fact that the Alliance and the Council still won't listen to him, more than the fact that they're punishing him for deserting and going against what they wanted him to do as both a Commander and a Spectre.

Commander Shepard also doesn't have a whole lot in the way of pride. Sure, he has personal motivations and pride, and he'll get a little irritated if you try and insult him, but he's not too concerned with things overall. Most of his desire to present himself well is so he can continue to wage good alliances and help everyone out. He won't be too concerned with rogue tabloid reporters, Shepard VI's made after his death, or what everyone thinks of him working with Cerberus. He's capable of navigating the political climate well enough regardless of his reputation, even managing to go so far as to make a valiant attempt at a Quarian court system when he was grossly undeprepared and underinformed on the entire situation— and more or less pulling it off. He doesn't mind being the brunt of jokes, or being made fun of for his absolutely terrible dancing. He's a good sport about teasing. He tends to sway public favor not by his large, overt actions, which are subject to all sorts of second guessing by the media, but by his smaller actions. He runs around the Citadel helping people, he helps promote businesses and stop violence, does errands and helps people regardless of race, gender, or their alliance, simply because they need help. People don't lightly forget that, and it works heavily in his favor.

More than everything, Shepard is the sort of person to keep moving forward. Even when horrifically wounded, even with the knowledge that there's no possible way for him to make it out of a situation alive, he'll keep working towards a positive end— the best possible end that he can achieve, for everyone he feels he's responsible for (which is... pretty much everyone in existence).

Overall, Shepard is a good Commander and a better friend; a strong leader with a stronger moral compass (even if he thinks about some less than charming options once in awhile), and he manages to do what he set out to accomplish: save the galaxy, and as many people as he could.

SAMPLES:
"Zodion" First-Person Network Entry: [There's the clinking of ice against glass, and then a picture to accompany it— a muscled man with dark, shaved hair and a drink in his hand.] I'm Commander Shepard, and this is definitely not the Citadel. [He takes a sip of the drink, amusement on his face, and then he waves a hand at his surroundings.]

So this is the afterlife I get, huh? Not exactly what you usually hear advertised. I was mostly just looking for a place to relax and get a drink. Pretty easy to find. I was hoping for one with an umbrella in it. [There's a laugh, short, but light.] Maybe next time.

I've got some friends that owe me a drink, actually— maybe you've heard of them. Garrus Vakarian? James Vega? Kaidan Alenko? Anyone from the Normandy'd be a great sight right about now. [there's a tone in his voice like he's not entirely sure if he wants to hear that they're here or not— he'd rather hear that they survived.]

This seems a little too "save the planet" to be an actual afterlife, though. We're not anywhere I've heard of in the galaxy before. Sounds a little like Illium, though.

It's great, though— a mission disguised as a vacation. Some more information would be great. I've picked up as much as I can, gotten all nice and settled in, but I figure the best place to look for some more details is everyone else here. I'm a little more curious if anyone knows more about the people claiming they're gods. I haven't heard a whole lot about them, but it's pretty suspicious. Maybe we could talk over a drink. [you know, if you're suspicious of the devices like Shepard is.]

It'd be nice to make some new contacts. [It'd be foolish not to. Shepard raises his drink, and then turns the feed off.]

"Zodionlogs" Third-Person Prose Entry: The first thing Shepard processed was that he had eyes. He processed this first because he opened them and could see, and for a second, it didn't matter that nothing he could see looked at all familiar, because he was busy wondering exactly why he still had eyes. The curiosity trailed into the fact that he still had a head, and a mouth, and hands, and legs, and they all still worked just fine. He stood up and tested all of them, hummed a few off-key bars of an old tune, and patted himself down, just to make sure.

"Huh," he said. The first time he'd come back from the dead had been considerably more painful, and a lot less quiet. This place? It didn't look like any science lab he'd ever seen, and even then, he was a bit skeptical that even all the progression of science in the galaxy could bring him back when he'd been disintegrated to remake civilization. Despite that? His heart was beating, his lungs were working just fine, and he wasn't even in any pain.

So, Heaven, maybe? He kind of figured he'd see Ashley, maybe Thane. Legion, too— if there was anyone who deserved to get some sort of Heaven after everything, it was definitely Legion. Instead, all he saw were some nice surroundings, fairly pretty, with an altar being the only thing to draw his attention. He made his way over to it, caution thrown to the wind in light of the complete lack of threats in his surrounding. If there was one thing reapers weren't, it was subtle, after all, and unless the last half hour of his life had been a hallucination, he'd fixed that, anyway.

Yeah, he was definitely leaning towards a weird afterlife. He suddenly regretted not ever looking into religion. Made it more of an adventure now, though, didn't it? He headed over to the altar, reeling back slightly when the water was suddenly rising around him. Okay, that was a little weirder. More weird was the fact that he was naked in the reflection of the water. For starters, he was fairly certain most water that clear was capable of being seen through, and on top of that, he was pretty sure he was still clothed.

He ran his hands down across his armor, double checking that it was all still there with a quick look. Yeah, all still intact. He frowned a little more, reaching out to press his fingers against the water. No, that was definitely water. Something in it, maybe? Combined with an antigravity field and a trick of the light, it could be possible. He considered the water for a moment before shrugging a shoulder, letting a little bit of recklessness take over. Nothing bad had happened yet. He stuck his head through the water, shaking it a little and pulling it back pretty quickly. That had... gone exactly how it was expected to, really. Sort of reassuring, actually.

His eyes caught sight of the tattoo on his shoulder— and then his brow quirked. That was new. Last time he was brought back, he had some fancy scars to show for it, and not a weird... ...upside down penis? That looked familiar, actually... Shepard quickly shucked off the armor on his top to doublecheck the location of the tattoo, looking over his shoulder and flexing the skin. A few experimental prods told him that it seemed, for all intents and purposes, like a basic tattoo. Worse things had happened to him before.

He picked his armor back up, tugged the undershirt on and tucked the rest of it under his arm. He didn't see a need to be anymore bulky than he had to be. He opened the box on the altar and promptly frowned. Was that... wow, he hadn't seen a device like that since Alliance history courses on outdated technology. He picked up the communication device, flicking it on curiously and quickly thumbing through the options. Intuitive, if low-tech... He'd dealt with worse. Tali would be horrified.

The letter took him a moment longer (and when was the last time he'd actually seen a letter written on paper?), but he grabbed it out and shook it open, eyes scanning the text rapidly. Well, that was... cryptic. He frowned a little at the letter, and it clicked as to where he'd seen the symbol before. Old earth astrology. About as outdated as the device he was holding, really.

Well, if this was the afterlife, it was a pretty crappy one. Who rewarded someone for saving the galaxy by making them do it again?

Shepard sighed, pocketed the device and the letter, and then set off to find some more information.