Lydia Jackson was an army brat, her parents both in the military. The moved around a lot from base to base while she and her siblings were growing up.
She was rough-and-tumble, kind of a tomboy her whole life, and she never had any trouble handling guys that got too hands-on with her when she blossomed into a beauty. With two older brothers she’d been fighting with her whole life, boyfriends and wanna-be boyfriends were no problem at all.
That didn’t mean her judgement was always the greatest when it came to guys, though. She dated her fair share, and maybe one or two more, and always they ended up being jerks somehow. Maybe it was her attraction to the bad boy type, or just poor luck of the draw, but whether she left them or they left her, it never ended well.
She never let it worry her too bad. She’d find the one eventually, she figured, or she wouldn’t. Either way she had things to do besides stress over what she couldn’t change.
One time she’d been sure she’d found the one. He was kind and considerate, but still bad-ass enough to kick ass when the time came. They were together almost a year when she found she was pregnant. He didn’t take the news well. He showed his true colors by vanishing the next morning without a word. She tried to track him down, but never did find him, the bastard.
She named her little girl Lila, and Lila became her world. A world with a heavy financial burden for a young single mom, but still her world.
She made her parents proud when she enlisted, following their examples, and her brothers’ too. She adjusted very well to military life. She could follow orders to the letter, even when she didn’t like it, and impressed every commander she had.
She was offered the chance to join the Dawn Rose project. She explained that she couldn’t possibly accept it, she had a daughter to raise. She’d thought the matter was settled for several weeks when her superiors came back to her and explained that she was made of the right stuff they were looking for, and that if getting her on board meant taking her daughter too, well, her daughter would just have to go.
Lydia accepted the offer after talking it over with her family. They weren’t excited to lose her, of course, nor their granddaughter, but their family would live on two worlds. That was nothing to scoff at.
Lydia accepted, determined to build the best new world possible for Lila, her world.