Hello there! This is my intro for this fic. . We begin our story after the destruction of the reapers. Shepard: wounded and stranded. Garrus: terrified and alone. Why oh why would someone ever write something so painful? Don't deny it. You like the chapter will focus on Shepard. The next will focus on Garrus. I'll switch around after that in different orders. We'll see.
I'm going to keep this one short and will be done with it relatively soon. THEN I'm gonna write another one that is more M rated cause damned if this ship doesn't give me the honey glows something awful. I hope you like it!
That boy. The catalyst. He—it was with her again. This time it was so much better though. All of the suspense from the dreams that Shepard had had aboard the Normandy was gone and filled with a sense of true peace. The empty forest was replaced with a dark that she didn't believe even the brightest of lights could pierce, and yet next to her was that little boy staring up at her with a smile. He was pure light just like when he was aboard the crucible and in this moment, she wasn't sure if what she felt was warm or cold, but she was serene. There was no wondering or worrying. She knew where she was or where she was headed. Death was with her and she was not afraid nor was she expecting otherwise. After what she had done—what she had been through, she was almost waiting for this feeling of peace. Even if this peace was worth such great sacrifice.
"You surprised me." Said the AI in the child's voice. This century's old program was finally free to rest as if she was. "You have such faith in the world that you have put so much work into building up." The child took to walking down what now appeared to her as a tunnel with a light at the end. Throughout the age-old human saying about dead, her feet moved to follow it. Her chest ached and she felt cold. She was sore in all sense of the world. There was only that one thing that kept her here.
Once she was dead, she would not feel this hollowed pain anymore. The pain of not being able to be with him. She knew that soon he would find a new path that lead away from her. He was alive and she felt peace. Her every fiber told her to fight—to push and pull until she could see him again. She could feel the fight draining from her. The war had gone on for so long and when she got to where she was going, she would go take a seat at that bar and relax for once. She would wait for him.
"You can tell yourself what you want to," continued the AI. "But you aren't done yet. Not nearly." That was when she noticed it—the fact that as she put a foot down she took a step away from the light. The boy was almost gone now. He was so far off that he turned into the light at the end of her tunnel. So why couldn't she follow?
"I am not so cruel as to do this for no reason. Do not worry. You are free to go. You are just not free to die yet."
That was it. Darkness enveloped her and suddenly she felt all of her pain crashing back through her body. To the very tips of her fingers and toes, she felt a pain that was more than just a sharp sting in her heart. Her arms, legs, everything was pinned down and all that was above her was a crack of what could have been daylight. She had no strength but her heart was racing now and her armor, no matter how bent and broken, had somehow kept her from completely bleeding out. The crash must have been massive and yet she survived. Adrenaline was the powerful natural substance that saved her life in that moment. With more strength than she could ever muster on a good day she pushed one of her hands up through what she assumed, in those small moments, was the wreckage of the citadel itself. She shifted around whatever large rubble crushed down on her and, with one arm, pulled herself halfway out from underneath. That was as far as she could go but it was far enough.
She thanked the stars that she wore her heaviest helmet that day and that the Cerberus implants seemed to be doing their jobs, but now she could do no more. This was more pain than she had ever felt in her entire life, but physically and emotionally. Seeing the sky again, she almost wished to live just one more day. Even if it meant another fight or another reaper, she wanted to live to see him one more time. Her body slumped back down and fell completely against the now cold ground. Above her shone, a red sun in a greenish sky but soon enough she saw nothing; her heart and her mind battled between rest and desire. It was unintentional but she would later come to realize that this is what kept her alive.
It wasn't until so much later that the crater that the citadel had created was found. Its still burning fire giving away its location only to finally die as the first recovery ship landed.
So there's the first chapter. I like to keep them at around 1000 words and just make more chapters instead of long chapters that are hard to pay attention to. SO please be patient with me. Thanks for reading. Maybe send me a review? Tell me that you hate it for all I care- I want to see what people think about my work!
