Chloe Michel: Citadel Physician

Dr. Chloe Michel was a human physician who operated a small Med Clinic in the Upper Wards of the Citadel. The daughter of two Alliance military medics, she kept the family tradition of medicine but preferred to work as a civilian. Her willingness to help those in need repeatedly drew her into events far larger than her clinic, beginning with the wounded quarian she treated in 2183 and ending with service during the war against the Reapers.

A clinic in the Wards#

Michel came from a family of healers; her parents had served as medics in the Systems Alliance military, and she carried on their work in a civilian capacity. Before opening her own Med Clinic she had worked at another practice, but was dismissed for giving away medical supplies free of charge, a habit that reflected her instincts but left her vulnerable. That past would later be used against her.

Her clinic became entangled in the hunt for Saren Arterius when a badly wounded Tali'Zorah stumbled into it and collapsed. Tali had obtained information linking Saren to the geth and had been pursued across the Citadel by his agents, taking a wound along the way. As Michel treated her, the quarian recounted her journey, and the doctor helped put her in contact with someone who could pass the data to the Shadow Broker. Soon afterward, Michel found herself under threat from thugs who had come to silence her. Commander Shepard, arriving at the clinic in search of Garrus Vakarian, helped him drive off the attackers and rescue her. She explained that she had treated a quarian claiming to hold evidence about the attack on Eden Prime and had referred the quarian to a Citadel fixer, only to be shocked to learn he had betrayed the Shadow Broker to work for Saren.

When Shepard returned, the doctor was being blackmailed: someone was demanding medical supplies, threatening to expose the circumstances of her earlier dismissal and cost her the clinic. Shepard could intervene on her behalf and trace the scheme. Grateful for the help, Michel offered discounts on her goods and became a reliable supplier of medical equipment to the Commander during the pursuit of Saren.

The Reaper War#

Michel remained on the Citadel in the years that followed. By the time of the Reaper invasion in 2186 she had risen to oversee human medical care at Huerta Memorial Hospital, where she helped treat the surviving member of Shepard's old ground team after the attack on Earth. With the right encouragement she could be persuaded to serve as the physician aboard the Normandy SR-2 for the duration of the war. Whether she did so depended on Shepard's choices, including the fate and wishes of Dr. Karin Chakwas, the ship's longtime doctor. Examining the rebuilt Commander, Michel noted the cybernetic implants that had restored Shepard and remarked on the cost of the ship's upgraded medical bay, but she embraced the more demanding work as a chance to make a real difference.

Aboard the Normandy she settled into the crew's routines, trading reflections on the nature of synthetic life and, like Chakwas, holding that artificial minds were not a valid form of life. She also helped Shepard arrange an exchange of medical supplies with the refugees aboard the Citadel, confident she could use the goods to improve the efficiency of medi-gel. Her own family, she revealed, had been on Earth when the Reapers came, and she had a brother on the Citadel during the Cerberus attack on the station.