This started out as just a few words in my head but they just repeating over and over again. And then I finally heard this little voice in the back of my, for days, kept saying, "Write a fanfiction!" So now I'm finally doing it, though instead of starting off with the first game, I'm deciding to start with the Mass Effect 2, where all the fun happens. I hope you enjoy it!
The Normandy flew silently through space, like a breeze on a seemingly windless day. Tali, as usual spent her time in the engine room studying the massive drive core, the stealth systems, and occasionally conversing with Engineer Adams. Garrus spent most of his days upgrading his rifles or calibrating the Mako's torrents. Wrex spent most of his days brooding in the corner, though he did occasionally share some of his stories with Shepard. Kaidan spent his days going over staff reports on the crew deck, and Liara spent her time in the back of the medical bay going over all that she had learned after the failed Reaper invasion while Dr. Chakwas went over stock and medical reports and, very often, reminding Joker to take his medicine through the comm. Navigator Pressley, Joker, and a few support staff were in the bridge. They were looking through reports of human vessels going missing in the cluster.
"We haven't seen anything in this cluster for days," Pressley said, "There's nothing out here!" Joker hit a few buttons on the holographic board. "This is where those ships went missing, so there's got to be something."
"My money is on slavers. They're all over the Terminus Systems."
"Scanners have picked up an unidentified vessel," a woman interjected. "Doesn't look like any ship I've ever seen," Joker observed. "Probably a geth ship. We can send somebody out here to take care of it," Pressly stated. The woman didn't take her eyes off the scanners. She messed with the controls to get new data. "The ship has changed course. Now on interject dejectory." Joker peered out the window and looked harder at the ship coming right for the Normandy. His mind immediately started to work. "That's not the geth." He started messing with the controls and getting the ship ready to move. "Everyone brace for evasive maneuvers!"
Joker made a hard U-turn which threw everyone who wasn't strapped to a seat or hanging onto something fly across the room. Tali fell down and skidded across the floor of the engine room along with the other engineers, Garrus smacked into the Mako, and Wrex fell flat on his face. Kaidan and Shepard were lucky enough to be close to something grabbable and, for the most part, stayed where they were. Not so soon after the drastic U-turn, the eerie ship fired a great big beam at the Normandy. The Normandy evaded for a few seconds but then was hit in one of the main engines.
The damage caused to the Normandy traveled through the systems and blew up Pressley's station, instantly killing him. The woman got up to check on him, but her station blew up as well and severely injured her.
Down on the crew deck, Kaidan runs past the mess area, now engulfed in flames along with the rest of the ship and down the hallway of sleeper pods, where Shepard is. She puts on her breather helmet, grabs a fire extinguisher, tosses it to Kaidan, and then grabs one herself. Kaidan gets to work on the fires nearby. "Will the Alliance get here in time?" he asks. "The Alliance won't abandon us. They'll be here."
"Joker's not leaving the Normandy. I'm not leaving either."
"Kaidan, I need you to round up the crew and take them to the escape pods!"
"But-"
"Kaidan, go!" The Normandy violently shook once more which threw Shepard from the middle of the hallway to the wall and Kaiden, who had a better sense of balance, only stumbled backwards a few steps.
He looked to see if Shepard was okay, but he was stopped from asking by the feeling of the Commander's hazel eyes staring sternly at him behind the tinted visor of her helmet. "Now!" Shepard commanded. She didn't have to yell like most people trying to take charge, what Kaidan had seen her do while she was in action and how she led the team made him give in and follow her orders.
Kaidan ran down the hallway and made his way to the elevator where he bumped into Tali, Engineer Adams, Wrex, Garrus, the requisitions officer, and only one other of the engineer staff. There were supposed to be five in total, including Adams. Dr. Chakwas and Liara came up behind him, looking a little bruised and weary, but she was fine. Kaidan pointed to another hallway and yelled over the explosions and alarms. "Get to the escape pods, now. Be quick! Make sure to get any of the injured on your way," Kaidan felt his heart wrench for what he was about to say, "Leave the dead behind." The group ran down the hallway and Kaidan followed, making sure to yell orders to those still around and leading them through the safest paths.
As people were getting into the escape pods, they made sure to fill every pod before launching. Kaidan stood at the entrance of one of them and helped people into the pod. One of the janitor staff ran down the hallway as fast as she could run, but an explosion blew and threw her across the hallway and she let out a terrible scream. Her neck rammed into a pipe on the wall, breaking her neck and killing her. Kaidan's heart stopped for a second and then started up again when his own survival instincts kicked in and he entered the pod. He hit the button to shut the door and the pod took off.
Back on the Normandy, Shepard made her way to the main floor of the ship. Everywhere she passed had nothing living to speak of. That meant everyone alive made it to the escape pods. Now all who was left was her and Joker. Shepard opened the door at the top of the staircase and all of the oxygen from the crew deck was sucked into space. It was only because of Shepard's mag-boots, which held her to the metal floor, that she wasn't sucked into space too. But the magnets were strong and the lack of gravity made it difficult to move properly. So Shepard was forced to walk her way to the bridge.
She passed the galaxy map, which was now in ruins, and she pushed small debri out of her way. Scraps of metal were scattered all over the place, floating and drifting throughout the dying Normandy. Shepard felt the vibration of an explosion nearby shake her entire being. She looked up and saw one of the engine wings had been completely torn off and its engines were still shorting out. More explosions shook Shepard's body as she neared the cockpit. Some chairs where the flight staff used to sit had broken free of their support and flew freely within the bridge. Normally the metal chairs would be too heavy for Shepard to move by herself, but this was space, and everything was weightless. She merely had to give them a light shove to move them.
Then she saw the cockpit. From the look of things, Shepard guessed that Joker had sectioned off the cockpit from the rest of the Normandy. What sectioned the cockpit looked like a thin, glowing yellow veil. They created an emergency mass effect field that gave the area some gravity, but it didn't keep the oxygen in.
Shepard passed through the veil and felt a small amount of gravity hold her down and her mag-boots turned themselves off. She could now move freely. Shepard ran to Joker's side. He was wearing an SR-1 beanie, his uniform jumpsuit, and an emergency breather mask. He mumbled to himself as he worked tirelessly at the controls. Shepard grabbed Joker's shoulder but he still worked at the controls. "Joker, we need to go!" Shepard yelled over the alarms and jumbling status reports coming from the comm. "I'm not leaving the Normandy. I can still save her!"
"Joker, the Normandy is lost," Shepard stated, the images of the broken ship flashing through her mind. She saw the proof herself. "Going down with the ship won't change that."
Joker stopped working the controls. It was hard to let his feelings go. "Yeah, okay," Joker gave in, "Help me up." Joker's Brittle Bone Disease made it hard for him just to go to the bathroom. Joker always denied other crew member's offers to help him make a more disabled friendly environment, but he was wishing for one now. An explosion bursted behind the two, which got Shepard a little anxious. She pulled at Joker's arm and forced him out of the chair. "Ow, watch the arm!" Joker whined. Shepard didn't respond, she merely rushed them both to the escape pod for the cockpit. Shepard opened the door and helped Joker inside.
Another explosion bursted from the cockpit, but this one turned off the emergency gravity and shook the bridge. Shepard was tossed away from the escape pod towards space. She caught onto the wall that held the launch button. "Shepard!" Joker cried out. Shepard acted quickly, she hit the launch button and then the pod was gone. Another explosion wrenched the wall out of Shepard's grip and she was sent flying once more. She rammed into a wall before she was sent out into the void.
Shepard watched the Normandy fall to pieces. The explosions shook her heart. All she heard was the sound of her own breathing and her heart racing in her ears. She took two deep breaths to calm herself down. That's when she heard it, the last thing anyone wants to hear when they're out in space: she heard the oxygen leaking out in a fierce rush from the tube that connected her helmet to her oxygen tank on her back. Shepard panicked. She lurched backwards and tried to reach for the tear in a desperate attempt to plug it. Nothing, no matter how hard she tried, it didn't work. Suddenly, she couldn't breath. No matter how hard she inhaled, nothing was filling her lungs. Her body struggled to move to a place where air was available, but there was none in space. Then there was a pull, a very strong pull, and her skin was starting to burn. Shepard was being pulled into the atmosphere of a nearby planet. The suffocation made Shepard weak and she stopped moving. She was losing consciousness, but it wasn't the lack of oxygen that would kill her. The last thing Shepard felt was her body in intense searing pain.
Joker watched Shepard enter the atmosphere of the planet nearby and watched her burn to death. His heart ached. He sat in his seat in the emergency pod crying. He didn't cry, he never cries, but this time he couldn't help himself. He felt responsible. It was only because he wouldn't leave that Shepard was now gone. Joker would sit in the pod until an Alliance ship came to pick up all of the escape pods. There were supplies in the pod to last him about two months.
Joker sat for about two days until a trade ship picked up all of the escape pods, he was the last to be picked up. All that was left of the Normandy crew waited in front of the landing door where Joker exited. They were happy to see that Joker was okay, but everyone immediately noticed that Shepard was not with him. Kaidan knew that she would have been with Joker, but everyone else thought that Shepard must have been within one of the other pods since she was not within their pods. Everyone was very concerned. Kaidan walked up to Joker. "What happened? Where's Shepard?" Kaidan asked. He didn't know why he asked because off the top of his head, he knew. Joker let out a heavy sigh and then a quick huff. The tightness of his chest made it hard to breath. "She's… Shepard's gone. She got spaced and… she entered the atmosphere of a nearby planet. She was burned to death."
Kaidan's heart dropped and his voice was stuck in his throat. The rest of the crew was a mix between non-believing to sorrow. Garrus developed a high respect for Shepard, teaching him that the fastest way wasn't always the way and to control how he responded to situations like Dr. Saleon. Tali, Liara, and Wrex all viewed Shepard as a close friend. Tali was grateful to Shepard after she let her have a copy of the Geth data they had gotten while taking out Geth strongholds, to help her live up to the expectations of her father. And Shepard did more for Wrex than his own family. He had regained his family armor with the help of Shepard, which helped him regain his own personal honor. He had humored the idea of returning to Tuchanka, to do what he didn't know yet. The rest of the crew viewed Shepard as something of a God, after everything she did tracking down Saren and stopping the Reaper invasion. For her to die was a shock.
The trade ship they were picked up in was heading for the Citadel, but they would be passing pretty close to the Migrant Fleet, so Tali made plans with the captain to drop her off. Wrex made plans to hitch a ride on a freighter at the Citadel. After everything that he learned from Shepard, Garrus decided to give C-Sec one more shot. Liara didn't know what she would do. She felt indebted to Shepard. After all, Shepard let her face Benezia. She decided she would start off her new life at the Citadel and then go from there.
But Kaidan, he took Shepard's death hard. They'd fallen in love together, went through Ashley's death together, and defeated Saren together. It's like he had lost a piece of himself. The Alliance heard of the Normandy's destruction and Shepard's death, so it had recalled all Alliance crew and officers for reassignment. So the Alliance has a ship ready to take them back home to Earth to Alliance Command. While everyone waited to get to where they were going, the crew isolated themselves as individuals or in small groups. Everyone knew that all of them would go their separate ways from this point forward.