I am the Bard of HeartDive

On the subject of Kaidan/Ashley not going with Shepard in Mass Effect 2: Please, imagine if Bernie Sanders died in 2018 and then was seen at the Capitol Insurrection wearing a MAGA hat in 2020.

holy SHIT FDGJSD

There is a tiny scene in Sea and Sky where Kaidan and Wrex are getting ready to go to the casino and Wrex starts teasing Kaidan about what his pet name for Shepard is and Kaidan's like "Mostly I just call him Ben." And Wrex laughs hysterically about how sickeningly cute that is and he can just imagine how sacchirinely adorable a "ben" must be until Kaidan explains that it's just Shepard's first name. It still makes me laugh when I think about it.

Oh man, I’m glad you like this scene. I like the idea that literally nobody knows Shepard’s first name. Or that he has a first name at all.

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Kaidan guffawed so hard he thought bourbon was going toshoot out of his nose.

“What?” Wrex folded his arms. The beat of the music in the renovatedChora’s Den tended to drown out the lower ranges of a Krogan’s voice. With everydrink, it had become funnier and funnier to Kaidan hearing Wrex having to talktwice as loud to be heard.

“Just, uh, thinking about how you didn’t know Shepard’sfirst name.” A quiet tenor that cut through the throbbing bassline.

“You really still on that?” Wrex shouted, breath stingingwith ryncol.

“You thought ‘Ban’ was a pet name,” Kaidan snickered.

“Can you blame me? You humans and your mating rituals. Makesthe turians look cold.”

“You’ve known him for years!” Kaidan made eye contact withthe bartender, who worked her way over. “You stood next to me at the memorialservice. There was a plaque for god’s sake.”

“Yeah, written in human-language. No,” Wrex slapped his handdown on the bar, startling the bartender. “His next drinks on me. Make it aQuad-Kicker.”

“What?” The bartender leaned in.

“Get him aquad-kicker,” Wrex shouted.

“On your tab, or what?”

Wrex balled up his fist, but continued to yell.

“Yes. Quad-kicker. Putit on my tab.”

Kaidan had his head in his hands, laughing.

“Anyway,” Wrex turned back to Kaidan, voice still booming. “Twoof you were always so sickeningly sweet, wouldn’t be surprised if they put yerpet-name for him on the tombstone.”

Kaidan burst out laughing.

“’Here lies Snookums Shepard.’”

“’He Went Out Fighting: DrukajakShepard.’”

“’Rest In Peace, Hot-Stuff Shepard’”

“’Forever In Memory, Little Kifrig Shepard’”

“’Commander Graham-Cracker-Lips Shepard.’”

“’Sprug-WhiteShepard.’”

“’Bone-Hardening-Weave Shepard.’”

“’Shepard the Gruklakblat.’”

Kaidan blinked.

“You made that last one up.”

“Like you’d know, kid.”

By now, the wasted krogan was yelling so loud his pet-nameepitaphs were drawing stares form across the bar. Kaidan was too inebriatedhimself to care, but also too inebriated to be able to think of any morepet-names.

“All fun and games thinking about his tombstone now that he’s back. It’s no good anyway,” Kaidan sniffed at the strange drinkthe bartender had set down in front of him. “I don’t have a pet-name for him.”

“Give it time.”

“I’ll drink to that!”