#i've been everywhere by johnny cash playing in the background —

[quick-drawn]

MUSE'S LIFE EXPERIENCE

Killed Someone Under Orders | Had Someone Killed On Their Orders | Killed Someone In Self Defence | Spared Someone’s Life | Invented Something | Been Hungover | Kissed Someone | Slow-Danced | Been In A Long-Term Relationship | Had Sex | Had Sex And Regretted It | Had A One-Night Stand | Had A Threesome | Experimented With Their Sexuality | Had A Kid | Adopted A Kid | Wanted To Have A Family With Someone | Done Something On Impulse They Regretted | Gone Traveling | Had A Bounty Put On Them | Eaten An Insect | Been Groped By A Stranger | Been Groped By Someone They Know | Been Dumped | Dumped Someone | Smoked | Gotten High | Flirted With Someone To Get Free Drinks | Put Someone In A Headlock | Won A Bet | Lost A Bet | Forgiven Someone Who Wronged Them | Indulged In Petty Revenge | Hallucinated | Has A Noticeable Physical Defect | Gotten A Noticeable Scar | Been Permanently Disfigured Through Injury | Kneed Someone In The Groin | Had An Unattainable Crush | Laughed Themselves To The Point Of Tears | Been Kidnapped | Been Brainwashed/Hypnotised | Had A Recurring Nightmare | Been Bullied | Bullied Someone | Experienced Survivor’s Guilt | Been Tied/Chained Up | Given Someone A Massage | Received A Massage | Been Backed Up Against A Wall | Shot Someone | Stabbed Someone | Saved Someone’s Life | Cheated On Someone | Been Cheated On | Been In An Open Relationship | Had A Friendship With Benefits | Been In A Queerplatonic Relationship | Had A Stalker | Been Betrayed | Been A Traitor | Been Possessed | Been In A Bar Fight | Been Thrown Out Of A Bar | Been Arrested [Imprisoned] | Broken Out Of Jail | Been To A Funeral | Been To A Brothel | Had Surgery | Broken Someone’s Trust | Broken Someone’s Heart | Had Their Heart Broken | Broken/Damaged Something Out Of Anger | Broken/Damaged Something Out Of Spite | Gotten A Piercing | Gotten A Tattoo | Used A Fake Name | Been Beaten Up | Been Tortured/Tortured Others | Been Abused | Been Blackmailed | Gotten Away With A Crime | Framed Someone Else For A Crime They Committed | Shared A Bed Platonically | Been In Love | Suffered From Sleep Paralysis | Been Forced To Flee Their Home | Learned A New Language | Joined A Rebellion | Fought On The Losing Side Of A War | Fought On The Winning Side Of A War | Become A Godparent | Become An Aunt/Uncle

tagged by: @chronal-anomaly thanks, lov tagging: you — and you better tag me so i can read it.

[shivunin]

I love your DA girls, but I didn’t realize you had a Shepard too! What’s her backstory, romance, etc?

Thanks for asking, anon! I haven't talked about her here much, but I love my Shep c:

Jesse Shepard (photo from this picrew)

Earthborn, Sole Survivor, Sentinel, Paragon

Romanced Garrus (but I uhhh. might have some fic of her and Miranda as well...)

She is a cowgirl

More specifically, her mom was a rodeo queen and the daughter of a rancher out in the middle of nowhere (she was actually born in Nothing, Arizona, which is sometimes erroneously called The Middle of Nowhere). Her dad was an electrical engineer and amateur hacker who passed his skills down to Jesse. When she started showing early signs of biotics (a shuttle crash near the family farm when her mom was pregnant exposed her to Eezo), her parents moved even further away from the city to protect her from the possibility of being hustled off to someplace like Jump Zero.

At about 9 years old, they went on a trip to the city. Her parents sat her on a bench for a moment while they went to rent a vehicle. What happened next is unclear, but there was a shuttle crash at the spaceport. No bodies were ever recovered. Still afraid of being taken by some nebulous government agency, Jesse slipped away into the streets and stayed there until she was 17. She took the fall for her girlfriend (also in the Reds) and chose to be sent to an Alliance school until she was old enough to formally enlist.

She played Johnny Cash's "I've Been Everywhere" in the Mako so many times that Garrus had to look up the lyrics (pure nonsense) to figure out what the fuck the song was talking about

She also roped the pyjak to catch it without hurting it on that one planet in the first game with all the goddamn pyjaks

I created her because I wanted to play with Mass Effect's depiction of human culture as homogenous in the era that the games take place. I got to thinking about all the subcultures that exist in the world now, and how they might look/exist in this version of the future. There might be a global human Alliance, but I imagine that all of the rich (messy, wonderful, contradictory) cultural details that exist now would still exist in that future, too. I wanted her to have a more concrete attachment to earth than "orphaned, was in a gang." You know, so it would hurt more to come home in the third game.

In this case, her background is largely formed by Hispanic rodeo culture near where I live. Extremely fun time, highly recommend reading more about it/visiting a rodeo if that's an option for you.

Also---and I know this is apropos of nothing---I take exception to femshep not getting to wear the cool leather jacket that m!shep wears, so that is part of her trademark style.

[silverskye13]

[I've Been Everywhere by Johnny Cash plays on repeat in the background]