Referring to a recent reblog, I've been thinking about the story of a Shepard with aspects of every background. Firstly, I think it's an awesome idea that I'm a little mad I never thought about before. Secondly, it makes too much sense for Shepard to have a more thoroughly noteworthy career than just a single great thing.
Shit, one of the things is simply (they said lightly) surviving a Thresher Maw attack, and I bet there are plenty of other servicepeople who survived terrible odds, too. Having a more robust record makes too much sense, even if they never promote Shepard above Commander (jealous Alliance brass pissing and shitting about Shepard working for the Council and not exclusively for them, I guess).
Anyway, I think the service record is easiest to configure (there's a whole timeline for the events already—I'm decently sure—but you can also play around with the order for different personalities, which I think would be really cool). What might be a bigger challenge is nailing Shepard's pre-service history, but I have a setup thay I quite like.
Shepard is born into a military family, single child or otherwise. One parent remains in the military (mom from Spacer origin) and the other becomes a stay-at-home parent (SAHP, for short here). Altogether, they either already had a home or SAHP moved with Shepard (and any siblings, if that's your jam) to Mindoir after a few different places to stay close-ish to Momshep (cue Colonist origin). After the attack on Mindoir by slavers, Shepard is still the only survivor (apart from the other one, of course, but shush), and I see two directions: Momshep, heartbroken over the loss of SAHP and any potential other children, thrusts herself in her military career even more, effectively abandoning Shepard to Earth foster care so that she doesn't have to reconcile with the loss of her family (sad option); Momshep truly believes all of her family died because maybe, for some reason I don't have right now, Shepard isn't identified and still ends up on Earth in the foster system (sad still, sure but less "parent abandonment" sad); or somewhere in the middle, like Momshep sending Shepard to Earth foster care (maybe run through family or military) because she still wants to support Shepard through the money she makes in the military but doesn't trust anywhere else as home anymore (and cue Earthborn origin). Regardless, to keep much of the remaining canon in check, Momshep re-enters Shepard's life eventually after Shepard joins the Alliance, either as an estranged parent trying to do better, a deeply loving parent happy to know her child simply still exists and is thriving (in a way she understands), or some secret third or fourth thing.
Nevertheless, there's story here—a rich one—and I bet there are plenty of fanfics that already did these things in a better way than what I've done pondering it now, lol.
I might think on this more later to make a combined origin backstory of my own, one that is actually a finished thought, anyway. I don't know.
