AN: The idea for this story struck me down one day as I was waffling around playing various ideas, and the foundation for a vastly different story led me down a line of thought that took me into dark, murky places that I don't usually frequent. I feel I need to stress that point. I was not, really, comfortable with how easily my brain slipped me into this bleak warren.

That said, I found it was a very intriguing warren, and while I try not to linger in dark places I do possess of small strain of sadism. In the space of not-even an hour I found myself thinking, with a small smile, of all the terrible ways I could twist it.

So, if you thought this would be a pleasant distraction, I urge you to go look at something else. Because this is a piece of nastiness that I'm throwing on the interwebs on the basis that misery loves company. This story has no happy ending, except on the off chance that I receive a torrent of feedback claiming that the story was good, but that I single-handedly lowered the average sugary-sweetness level of all Shep/Tali fics in publishing this. Or that I ruined someone's day. Both, I feel, are reasonable goals.

Also, this story should be relatively short. I'm guessing maybe 8-10 chapters, depending on length, inspiration and general laziness.

I suspect that this site somehow alters the documents I upload at 2 in the morning, because there's no way I could otherwise miss so many grammatical and syntax errors. Ever. *sigh*

With that out of the way, I hereby declare the following:

1: I don't own any of the Bioware characters, settings and whatever else they got. I'm also not receiving any pay for this, although I certainly wish I was. That'd be all kinds of awesome.

2: Reviewers are awesome. Favourites and alerts are also nice, but reviews are more so in that they're a definite source of motivation and ego-boost, as well as helping me improve my craft if you spot something I didn't. It happens.

3: I apologize in advance for the use of the word 'belay'. I like the sound of it, and I don't get to use it nearly enough. I should totally dress and talk like a pirate to get away with doing that.

Alright, let's wreck your day!

Deadly Resurrection

Chapter I: War in Epirus

Tali'Zorah Vas Normandy surveyed the battle from the bridge of the star ship Em'koalis, listening to her underlings shout out reports from both their own ship and many of the others. The Migrant Fleet was a swarm amongst many others, though theirs was the largest by far. Theirs had, until a few years ago, been the home of almost an entire species. With the help of their old nemesis', the Geth, they'd been able to retrofit most of their ships into warships. Her own ship was one of thousands.

"Brace for impact!" One of the ensigns called out, and she hastened to obey.

All across the bridge the inhabitants Em'koalis rocked as it was struck by a stray piece of wreckage.

It seemed to be the only real danger the Reapers could pose at this distance: Tearing through their hulls with their ruined carcasses. The Reapers seemed to explode violently when their lives were ended, raining the remnants of their hulls outwards. Her satisfaction turned grim, wondering how many ships their enemy had destroyed simply by dying. Most of the shrapnel was deflected by the protection of their Liveships, but there was still a good deal that passed through that presented a danger.

The old Liveships, for so long the beating heart of their people, now stood at the forefront of their forces, each one a bastion against the onslaught. Their kinetic barriers, already formidable even before the retrofit, had been upgraded into vast, battlefield encompassing shields that could withstand the full power of a Reaper for hours before collapsing. All four of them were the hub for an assault force, each one advancing inexorably forward against what looked like a vast swarm of malevolence.

But they were not alone. What remained of the Hierarchy war fleet seethed like an angry mist at the heart of the conflict while their ponderous dreadnoughts behind the barriers of the liveships firing into the chaos. Alongside them was an amalgam of the Systems Alliance Carriers, Asari Republic dreadnoughts led by the Ascension and a vast swarm of Geth warships that switched from short to long range on what looked to be a seemingly random basis. The Salarian presence in the fleet was the smallest of the council races, its meagre dreadnoughts acting as intelligence hubs and coordinating their allies instead of fighting outright. While some of her comrades in arms may have been resentful of their relatively passive role in the battle, Tali knew better. She'd already received two critical feeds from them and her archives were constantly being updated as the capabilities and weaknesses of the Reapers were exposed. Though as far away as she was from the battle the use of said information was limited, as it was difficult for her to line up shots without endangering her allies.

Advancing from the relay station were the alien shapes of the Rachni. They'd come unannounced, and it had taken a personal broadcast from Shepard to assure the rest of the fleet that they weren't allies of Reapers. They'd be in the fray shortly, but their larger vessels had already opened fire. The purple luminescence of their weaponry was a stark contrast to those possessed by the citadel races, but they were startlingly effective at tearing through the barriers of their enemies.

Somewhere out in the heat of the battle, masked by advanced equipment and the general chaos of war was a ship that she had spent some of the most important years of her life in until recently: The Normandy. Occasionally she caught the telltale blue pillar of its main cannon, and reveled in the knowledge that somewhere out there yet another Reaper was put out of their collective misery.

Which wasn't to say that the whole of their effort was a mobile one. Further back, on the periphery of the battle, were the Geth Warp Projection Stations. Three of them had been constructed from the wreckage of the Citadel, each one a living nexus of the Geth. They were sleek, spiraling things with countless mass effect reactors ringed on the inside of their forms. Each one radiated an eerie blue light that only grew more intense until they blazed like distant stars, whereupon they would unleash a powerful blast of energy that tore the Reapers apart. As if that wasn't enough, each of them used their collective intelligence against the Reapers themselves, each one hacking into their more organic counterparts in an effort to further disable them.

On the whole, while there had been terrible sacrifices made, everything seemed to be coming together in their favor. She could only wonder at how simple this battle would have been if only the Turian Hierarchy and the Terminus Systems had rallied to her lover's call to arms. Regardless of warnings left unheeded and deaths that could have been prevented, Tali beamed proudly at it all, delighting in the carnage their collective efforts wreaked upon their enemies. After so long of fighting, the end was in sight.

"Can we fire yet?" She asked loudly at the whole room.

The bridge of her ship more resembled something like a work office than it did a traditional cockpit. But it allowed for her officers to work in close proximity, able to alert her to anything simply by shouting rather than having to patch through a communications system. It was one of the holdovers of the Migrant Fleet that even the newer of their ships were reluctant to remove.

"Neg, ma'am. Our reactor's still cooling down."

Damn. She didn't like being a spectator to it all, but they'd almost overheated their core after they'd expended most of their payload by firing off their powered weapons.

"Alright." She bit off, her annoyance showing through. "Don't bother waiting for an order when we are. Start calculating vectors now, then fire when ready."

"On it, ma'am." Came a small chorus from various corners of the room.

She paced restlessly, eyes locked on the holographic real-time display of the battle. They'd destroyed almost half of the Reaper fleet/species so far, even if they had lost many of their close-range warships to do so. No matter. If the Reapers managed to close in on them the alliance carriers would unleash a vast swarm of unmanned drones that would pick the Reapers apart like so many bugs.

"Captain, the Geth are ready to blast. Liveships will drop the barriers in five!"

She bit back a curse as she turned her attention back to her crew.

"Belay the order to fire, power up our barriers."

Nobody answered, but she didn't expect them to. Most were too engrossed by duties that had nothing to do with her order while the others were too busy obeying to do so. Tali heard the barriers power up like a distant hum growing louder. If they'd pulled up the steel 'curtains' over their viewing windows they'd see a shimmering iridescence as the barriers grew in power.

"Fired. Brace for the shock wave."

Again she latched down on her station, tensing for the massive surge of energy. A moment later it passed them by, rocking the ship like an earthquake.

When it passed there was only silence for a moment.

"Liveships powering barriers back up, we can drop at our leisure."

"Do it." Tali ordered, focusing once more on the monitor of the battle.

A second later one of the larger of the Reapers dropped off it, confirmed a moment later by an alert from the Salarians that Harbinger, the apparent general of the Reapers, had been destroyed. Relief coursed through her at the news. She was about to share the good news when something else caught her attention. Her breath stopped as a blip showed up on it, a tiny red dot against the seething of their own forces represented in white and the Reapers shown in blue. She knew it for what it was in an instant. It was the Normandy, though why they had dropped their stealth mode was beyond her.

"Captain, we're getting a feed from the Normandy!" Someone alerted.

She felt her pulse quicken as she hastily patched it through to her omni-tool, the din of the ship drowning out as she focused on the feed.

A badly blurred face phased into existence just above her wrist. It slowly defined itself into a face she was intimately familiar with. In the background she could hear sirens and the sound of shouting, though much of it was greatly distorted.

"Shepard?" She asked, dread creeping into her voice.

A terrified grin passed over the face before it disappeared for a moment into static. A moment later he was back, this time the image made completely from shades of red.

He said with his voice drowned out for a moment. "We've been- More static. -eckage! Cockpit's gone, we'er dri-"

All strength left Tali as the feed went on, and she didn't even notice it when her legs buckled under her. Somewhere in the bridge somebody was calling out to her, but she couldn't hear it. Instead there was only the flickering face of the man she loved, his voice broken by the damage his ship had taken.

No! Her mind cried out, despair hitting her like a physical force. It's a lie! A Reaper lie!

"-ot going to make i-"

Not again...

The voice winked out once more, replaced by a haze of white and black. By now one of her crew had their hands on her shoulder and seemed to be trying to shake her free from her state. The only reason she knew this was because her arm was flailing wildly with the motion, and she stopped the crewman by pushing them away. Distantly she heard a crash as someone struck one of her monitors.

Shepard appeared once more, his face filled with resolution.

"I love y-"

The feed died.

A moment later the red dot on her monitor vanished.

The battle ended for Tali'Zorah in that moment as she devolved into a shivering, sobbing mess. Her second in command, seeing her unfit to command, took up her duties and resumed the rest of the fight.

It was later, and the 'battlefield' for want of a better word was even more silent that space would apparently allow. The silence of the grave, it seemed, superseded the quiet of vacuum.

Inexplicably the Salarians failed to transmit the fate of the Normandy until the end of the battle when it was clear that they'd already won. It was only those who had known the members of the crew that complained at the late notification, and they'd only done so after the battle. The Salarians, for their part, simply admitted to not having noticed in the confusion, though it seemed a weak excuse.

Most secretly suspected that they'd simply decided not to, fearing that the destruction of their flagship would be too heavy a blow to the morale of the collective fleet.

But now, with the dangers of core exposure down to relatively safe levels several medical ships flitted from wreck to wreck on the off chance that somehow a section had remained intact, or to collect an escape pod. It had been agreed that the fate of the vast cloud of wreckage would be decided after 'a proper time for mourning' had been exceeded. But for now, survivors were the priority. Strangely enough, one was excluded for the personal use of Tali'zorah, who not an hour before that had told the Admiralty Board that they would give her one or she would commandeer it. Upon seeing the young woman so distressed they authorized it, hastily readying a small crew to help her. The general opinion was that they owed her that much, at least.

She made a beeline for the last known coordinates of the Normandy and began the search for the signature profile of the ship. Amongst the wreckage of so many ships it seemed a fool's task, but they were surprisingly successful. After a short search they spotted the telltale engines of the destroyed vessel, and for a moment things looked promising.

Only the front portion of the vessel had been destroyed, broken off a little over halfway. Further inspection revealed that barriers were still active, preventing the vacuum of space to ravage the ship further. Anyone who hadn't made it to the escape pods could still be alive, provided that core was also intact and the had interior not succumbed to fire. A brief scan also revealed that not only was the core intact but was still functioning. After hours of despair and crying, Tali felt hope rise in her heart once more. She hastily put on the extra layers of suiting that would be necessary to survive the void, her lips a constant mumble of prayer and curses.

She boarded the ship along with two others, a medic and a human marine that had apparently been dispatched to protect the Alliance's property. In any other circumstances she'd have been insulted (or even pointed out that it was technically incorrect, as the ship had initially been stolen from Cerberus, and was therefore their property), but she was much more focused. Shepard could still be alive. They entered through the ruined hub the CIC, each one unnerved by the unearthly gloom that seemed to have settled in. Only the emergency lighting was still functioning, shedding a pale luminescence.

The room had been decimated by whatever had hit them, leaving only the combat stations around the great hologram projector that she'd watched her lover plot over so many times. The consoles were all dead and vacated.

Working up her courage, Tali approached the projector.

"EDI?" She asked tentatively, not sure whether she should fear a reply or not. For as long as she had been on board the ship, the idea of an artificial intelligence still unnerved her.

Tali'Zorah Vas Normandy. The synthesized voice of the AI answered, without any inflection. Welcome back.

The quarian's brow scrunched up in confusion at the simple and strangely warm greeting. Not only was it out of place, but woefully uninformative for a synthetic mind.

And then she remembered where most of EDI was stored: A floor down, past the infirmary. There was a good chance that she'd been torn from the ship.

"EDI, what is your current status?" She asked, if only to confirm her own suspicions.

"This system is currently operating at minimum capacity." Came the prompt reply, again devoid of any kind of emotion. "Core is being stabilized, barriers maintained, basic life support-"

"Thank you EDI." Tali cut in, interrupting the AI midstream. But no, it wasn't really an AI anymore. That part of it was gone now. "Can you tell me if there are any crewmen on board?"

"I'm sorry, that is beyond my abilities at the moment."

Tali cursed quietly, then sighed.

"Thank you for your help EDI, that will be all." She said, a bit more gloomily than she intended.

"Logging you out."

She motioned her two escorts closer, preparing herself to give orders.

"Alright, the ship can't tell us if there are any survivors." She informed them, unsure if they had been listening to their conversation. "We'll have to search manually."

She got two nods from them, and she continued quickly.

"Engineering and the hanger have the most room, so there's a good chance he- they might be there. If you two start there, I'll take care of the other decks."

The Alliance marine hesitated for a moment, looking as if he would protest at leaving her alone, but seemed to think better of it and merely nodded.

Minutes later they were gone, and Tali'Zorah was alone in the elevator heading up towards the loft. She doubted that Shepard would be up there, but she'd rather get it out of the way now rather than saving it for last. So many memories, so much time spent together there. It would not be a pleasant experience.

The doors opened up to the room, revealing that the damage in this part of the ship at least was minor. His fish tank had a small crack running along its length and his furniture had shifted, most likely from an impact.

There, at his work desk was the picture of the two of them together. She was unmasked and blushing while the man beside her wore a mirthful grin. He'd insisted on it, claiming that if she was going to 'hide herself' away in the engineering deck all the time he would have to have something to remember her by. The frame had been knocked on its side, prompting the quarian to reach out and right it. After a moment's thought, she instead tucked it into one of the folds of her suit. There was no point in leaving it on a wreck, especially not if- if-

She abruptly discarded that line of thought and busied herself with searching the room.

The bathroom was empty save for a carelessly dropped towel. The bedroom was much the same, though a bit messier. The man cared little for tidiness, and there were times when it'd grate on her nerves.

Unsurprised with not finding Shepherd, Tali returned to the elevator, telling herself that she hadn't really expected to find him there, and it wasn't a big deal that she hadn't. There was still the crew quarters and, of course, the engineering level. And if he wasn't there either, then he probably managed to escape.

Escape into space, where the largest battle ever in recorded history was raging, and likely the biggest in unrecorded history as well. Escape with a small, defenseless pod that only possessed the ability to float and scream out its current position to anyone inclined to listen.

Suddenly Tali wasn't sure whether she wanted to find Shepard aboard the ruined corpse of the Normandy or not. Both presented a set of dangers that chilled her bones and turned her blood to water.

She pushed those thoughts out her mind as the doors shut closed and tried to ignore the jaunty tune that began playing. She took this as further proof of EDI's technical lobotomy, as Shepard had forbidden the AI from ever 'trapping anyone in a steel coffin and forcing him to listen to insipid music' quite vocally one day on his way down to engineering. The entire crew had been laughing about it for days once Daniels had spread the story around.

She was beginning to see why he had done so, though. Happy tunes are not what one wants to hear when they're scared, worried and none too stable. An internal debate on whether the elevator would still function after a carefully placed shotgun blast was interrupted as the doors opened once more and she quickly stepped into the corridor leading from port to starboard.

"John?" She called out, worry in her voice.

There was no answer, but that didn't deter her from proceeding to examine both the observation decks, life support and crew quarters. She didn't find anyone, but there was evidence of a fire in the starboard port. The observation window had been smashed in by a stray piece of wreckage, tearing through the armor plating and then down in the deck below. It was likely that the fire originated there, and simply spread as far as it could before EDI managed to get the fire-depressors online.

A fire in the lower decks would be dangerous, even if the core was stable. There were fuel lines down there that, if ruptured, could turn the whole level into a veritable inferno.

She left the observation room harrowed but determined to find Shepard. There was a nagging thought in the back of her mind that told her that wherever the greatest danger to the crew was the captain would be close to. It was an unhelpful thought, one she did not care to entertain at the moment. There was still the mess hall and infirmary, after all. There was a small chance that he'd been injured on earlier, or that he'd merely been diverted in the hall for a moment when catastrophe struck. She was certain beyond reasonable belief that something along the lines of either of those had to have occurred.

As she entered she was treated to yet another look at the ruinous damage the ship had sustained, as the long corridor that had once lead to the main battery now ended in inky blackness and stars.

The mess hall proved her hopes empty, devoid of any life save the remains of a mangled crewman who had been dragged away from the where the fatal wreckage had struck. As horrible as the sight was, she could bring herself to feel only relief when she saw the man's face and didn't recognize it. She grabbed his dog tags as an afterthought, remembering how she had helped Shepard sift through the ruined husk of the former incarnation of the Normandy. They were important to someone, somewhere.

That left only the medical bay. If he was going to be anywhere on this level, that would be the most likely place. If he was there, however, then he was just as likely injured. Possibly dead, if he'd taken a critical wound as the Normandy

She moved toward infirmary, dreading what she would find.

The doors slid open, revealing...

Nothing.

The room was only mildly disheveled, otherwise undisturbed. No evidence that anything more dangerous than a nasty shake ever occurring.

As if to punctuate this horrifying disappointment she received an incoming transmission from the medic who had joined her.

"Tali'Zorah, I've found Shepard."

Her distress momentarily lifted before she remembered what she had seen in the Observation Port. Fear returned, gripping her like a vice. She was paralyzed for a moment before she found her voice again and answered.

"Is he alright?" She asked quickly, spinning around and dashing for the elevator.

There was apprehension in the quarian's voice, which only increased her own. "He's... I don't know. You need to see this for yourself. I'm in the hanger. I'll alert the human, and you can both see."

She hastily selected the lowest level of the ship as she answered.

"No!" She almost shouted the reply. "He'll only slow me down! Alert him once I'm there."

The doors to the elevator couldn't close fast enough for her, but the time it took for them to do so was the same amount for the medic to agree to her request. Perhaps it was the desperation in her voice that convinced him, or rather the knowledge that she was worryingly unstable.

"Very well, captain." Was the acknowledgement, and the transmission ended.

For the quarian woman, time seemed to move at a snail's pace. The few seconds it took to reach the bottom deck seemed to stretch on for an eternity, her worry playing on her perception more than anything else. Her eyes were riveted on the floor monitor as she descended.

When she reached the bottom and the doors opened she waited only long enough for them to allow her past, choosing to squeeze through rather than wait another second. Once past she scanned her immediate surroundings, searching for the man she loved.

"Tali'Zorah, over here!"

The voice came from across far across the hanger, and in a moment Tali was a flurry of movement once more. She was moving so fast that her shawl fell from her head and down to her shoulders, but she was heedless of this. Appearances were all well and good when the time warranted it, but right now was an emergency.

Had she been a bit more patient, and perhaps more aware of surroundings, she would have noticed the severe charring and fire damage across the room. Warped steel, blackened struts and, closer to the elevator, a large pipe that looked as if something had torn its way out of it. She would have taken note of this, and known an even greater despair than she was already experiencing. She would have expected the worst.

Which, when confronted with the truth, would only be an open debate on whether it was or not. As it was, Tali approached her lover with a small measure of hope, which made it that much more painful for when it was dashed.

She spotted the quarian kneeling over what looked like a body horribly burned. The sight stopped her for a moment, the dread sinking in all the deeper in her. But she pressed on, determined to see the matter through to the end. As she drew closer the medic glanced over at her and rose as if to greet her. But the movement revealed the prominent N7 mark on the body's breast as well as a burnt, blackened head.

The anguished cry that erupted from her mouth cut through whatever the medic was attempting to say. It was a primal thing that was all emotion, pain turned to sound. She collapsed beside the body, her hands afraid to touch it lest she somehow make it worse. That he would crumble to ash upon contact, taking away what little remained. For a few moments there was only the sound of sobbing, while the male quarian looked on with a helpless look behind his faceplate.

She didn't notice the other two forms not far away from her, both of which scorched in a similar manner, or the still-open hatch of the Hammerhead that would likely have told her exactly what had happened. She was too busy mourning. In fact, she didn't even notice when the man she was grieving for lighted up in an intricate network of bright orange. It was only when she felt hands on her shoulders that she was shook from her stupor long enough to see a pair of glowing red eyes.

She should have recognized his extensive implants, as well as what it would entail. She should have remembered that he'd already died once before, and the drastic measures that had to be taken to bring him back. She should have remembered the small handful of pills he had to take every week to replenish his supply of nano-machinery flowing through his bloodstream as well as the traces of rare elements they needed to stay active. She should even have remembered the nightmare she'd had to shake him out of, the one he'd later explained that he'd become Saren, more machine than man, and never realized it.

But she didn't. And when she saw what she thought a corpse burst into gleaming, mechanic life she recoiled in surprise, fearing that the reapers had done something to him, somehow.

"T, Tali?" The mouth moved, accompanied with the sound of cracking flesh as it did. A layer of charred flesh fell from the body's cheek, revealing the bright luminescence below.

The voice was strange, somewhat altered from what it had been, but she later explained that away to being the fire's fault.

"Shepard?" She choked out, confused as to what was happening. He was dead!

"I can't feel anything." The seared lips said, cracking to reveal the unearthly glow beneath. "Hard to move."

His voice was wrong, and after a second's thought Tali realized why: his body wasn't doing the talking. His implants were, somehow. They were synthesizing his voice, or at least attempting to. But that alone meant that he was still alive, despite the ruinous damage his body had sustained

As if to prove his point, his arm twitched towards her. It made a soft rustling and crackle as it did, each time it did revealing more of the unearthly glow. And then, before anyone could register what had happened, a loud crack sounded and the lower portion of his forearm broke free, revealing the bones below.

It was lined with a complex web of machinery, mottled by the sickly red blood and glowing orange nanites. As if unchained, the arm moved much more smoothly, and Tali found herself staring in horror at the skeletal arm.

"Shepard, don't move!" She cried out, and restrained herself at the last moment from grasping his hand. If his own tiny movements had managed to cause such terrible damage, what would hers do to him? "Keep as still as you can!"

"Why?" There was a note of panic in the strange voice, but the body stopped moving. "Tali? What's wrong?"

"Just, just..."

Tali didn't know what to do. Her mind was ablaze with shock and horror, but above all that was the overriding relief that, somehow, Shepard had defeated death once more.

"Holy god, what is going on here?"

The quarians were so absorbed by the sight of a talking corpse that neither had noticed the approach of the Alliance marine. Their heads whipped around as one at the sound, though Tali was more annoyed than angry at the interruption.

"We're talking." She said flatly, and turned back to Shepard.

"I can see that!" The marine snapped, and was now at her side. "But how is he doing it?"

"Who's there?" Shepards voice was edged with fear now. "I can't see, what's going on? Tali?"

She ignored the others, tried not to hear their mutterings as she leaned in closer to the body lying on the ground before her. It was unlikely he would know this, however, from what he had already told them. Deprived of almost all his senses, she wondered how he'd managed to cope so long.

"I'm still here, John." She said calmly. "We're just worried about you."

For a moment, there was no answer. Tali felt the fear well up in her, fearing that maybe his tenuous grip on life had slipped. But she was proven wrong shortly after this.

"I'm dying, aren't I?" He asked meekly, a voice so unfamiliar to her that she for a moment she was confused. He'd never been like this before.

"No!" She said loudly, as if saying it would make it so. "You have to stay with me, Shepard!"

Again, there was silence. Behind her, she could still hear her two escorts arguing, but their words were a mess of nonsense to her ears. There was only one person she could listen to at the moment, it seemed.

The cracked lips bent into a dead mockery of a smile, the burnt flesh of his cheeks cracking into light as they did.

"Of course I will. I'll always-"

The orange light faded and died abruptly, and his words ended mid-sentence.

Once again, Tali'Zorah Vas Normandy was left with a corpse.

Seconds passed as she tried to process what had transpired, confusion and horror readily apparent in her demeanor.

"Shepard?" She asked, her voice once more filled with dread.

Bad enough that she had had to witness his demise once already. But this... This was too cruel. Fate could not have been so malicious as to keep him alive long enough for her to arrive only to have to see it again.

"Shepard?" She asked again, her voice rising in volume with her fear.

Again there was no answer from the charred body, and the quarian let despair claim her.

She fell forward, and would have clasped her arms around the dead human's chest if she hadn't been restrained by those behind her. They were trying to tell her something, but the words were unintelligible to her.

She was drawn, involuntarily, back to the Alarei. Where she and Shepard had come across the body of her father. Where she'd finally allowed herself to seriously consider Sheppard as more than just her best friend and commander. When he'd pulled her into an embrace, giving her someone to reach out to when her whole world seemed to be collapsing around her ears, she'd known that no matter what else happened, he would always be there for her.

But now, inside the ruined husk of a ship she'd spent many of her best years in, there was nobody for her to reach out to. The man she'd come to rely so much upon, to love, was long gone. There would be no more embraces, no more soft comforts. Shepard was dead.

Her wails of sorrow were the only sounds she could discern now.

And then the corpse flickered into life again, an ornate weave of unearthly light. The quarian didn't know what had happened, her confusion only making things worse for her. But her cries faded away, and she stopped struggling against those behind her. For a moment all she could do was stare, in horrified wonder.

"S, Shepard?" She sputtered, her voice still tinged with sadness.

"Tali?" The corpse answered, confusion in its voice. "Where are you, I can't see you."

Her confusion increased at this, but she was calmed that he was back, though the matter of how was still beyond her.

"I'm still here, Shepard. I didn't leave." She soothed, trying not to let her worry show.

"Still here? I, I don't remember you coming."

She had become so accustomed to dread by now that she barely even noticed when it fell into her once more as his words sank in.

"Y, you don't remember talking to me not long ago?" She asked, fearing the answer.

"I, we-" Fear was in his own voice, a strange thing to hear from one so synthesized. "I remember fire. I, I can't feel anything, Tali. What's wrong?"

Tali'Zorah Vas Normandy felt like she wanted to cry, but the tears wouldn't come. Perhaps she was too drained already, or was simply numb to the pain by now, but she couldn't find it in her to shed any more.

Nothing, Shepard. She said leadenly, and this time she did grasp the hand, carefully. She tried to ignore the thin layer of charred skin that caked her glove as she did. "We'll fix this. I swear it."

AN: No, that isn't the worst I've thought out. I said it was going to a dark place, and this isn't even the cellar. Trust me, the man who's made it his personal mission to kill a part of your soul.