Commander Shepard had survived the Skyllian Blitz, a major assault on the human colony of Elysium. He lived to tell the tale while all around him perished into dust. Yet he did not escape that encounter unharmed. While the scars of his body healed, his emotional scarring ran deep. He had lost many good men that day that had died under his command. He received many medals for his efforts in defending Elysium and holding the line. A handful of soldiers also made it out alive. The Batarians hit the colony hard and the peaceful natives were no match for their onslaught. Had the commander not been there the colony would have surely fallen. Nothing could have prepared the alliance for the attack as they were used to fighting pirates in the Terminus Systems, not fully armed soldiers trained to kill. Shepard spent his last few months before the attack training the recruit that was placed under his command, Private Alistair Halls. He was a good kid, only 19 years of age fresh out of college. He was stationed to fly a ship to cover the ground teams during the Blitz, the "Platinum Guardian". The commander did not see that ship crash and could not communicate via com system because they lost communications with the air teams shortly after drop off." The private probably survived, he was a tough soldier " thought the commander, and He was, after all, trained by the best. They found the person responsible for the attack shortly after reclaiming the colony, He was a batarian called Thaug. The Alliance tried to arrest him as they found he had a long list of criminal offences including the near destruction of a colony with 70,000 humans living there! . He fled to the Hades Gamma cluster before the authorities could bring him in, but Shepard vowed to one day track him down. The Alliance knew Shepard was the best, which was why they sent him on this mission. He may not save everyone, or take his opponents down quick and clean, but he got the job done.