Around chapter 11 I lost where I was going with the story. I decided to try again and here is the first six chapters plus the intermission with fixed spelling and style mistakes and a few words added here and there. I also forgot to write a chapter on Tali's recruitment mission so I am going to do that next before I publish chapters 8-11. Wish me luck.

Shepard could not remember his dreams, or nightmares, but he knew what they were, the racial memories of protheans burned into his brain by the damned beacon. And why did his mouth feel like he has been chewing on an old carpet?

The worst part was that alongside the memories of prothean genocide his own were mixing in with all of that, the hellish fight on Elysium. He had saved the people last time, not without a lot of sacrifices but the thousands of civilians that were saved by the sacrifice of the people under his command was worthwhile, at least that is what both the logic and his duty said but it still did not make the loss of those he could not save any easier. In his dreams he saw Elysium again, this time as Reapers massacred all of them.

The Council and Alliance did nothing, well at least Anderson believed him mostly but even he sometimes let the doubts in his mind slip into his expression as he looked at Shepard.

After all who knows what the beacon actually did, it might have driven him delusional or worse, Shepard himself even wished sometimes that all this talk of Reapers was just something crazy born out of his own wild imagination spurned by the beacon.

The truth however was far less comforting, Shepard knew that Reapers were coming, he knew that they would kill millions, billions and he could do nothing to stop it. Not now and not without some serious help from the Alliance and the other council races.

Shepard felt the early stages of a headache, born out of frustration over his current orders. Both from Alliance brass and Council. After all that he had done over the past several months it felt like a fresh slap in the face, not enough to actually be painful, just enough to bring out the anger and indignation.

Stopping Saren and killing Sovereign was indeed a great victory but it seemed that everyone else was willing to simply ignore the fact that Sovereign was clearly not a geth ship. There were of course similarities, the rounded lines of the ship could be seen as something geth in origin but the tech was far too advanced.

Unclamping his jaw with an effort he rose to his feet, he was not going to get any rest so might as well get some work done. At least it was a short trip from his quarters to the mess.

As he rounded the corner he saw Ashley Williams sitting by the table, a steaming cup of what he suspected was coffee in front of her and she had all of her attention turned to the datapad on the table.

Gunnery Chief Ashley Williams was a good soldier, good friend, someone that he could trust to watch his back and trust his judgment. He knew that she had forced herself to change, to accept their non-human crew members, despite her earlier hostility towards anyone non-human. She had her reasons of course and some of the points she had brought up were quite valid but Shepard knew that it would still be better to stand together than to hang alone as the old saying goes. He also knew that she had changed only because she wanted him to like her. Maybe even love her. He wasn't sure what his own feelings were, he definitely cared for her deeply but he knew that would not be enough for her. While on the mission to stop Saren it all seemed so perfectly clear, finish the mission and then you can relax somewhere nice and sunny with her. Now that it was done the real world intruded. Ashley had already been having hard time in service because of her family, what would her fellow marines think now that she got involved not just with her commanding officer but also with the first human spectre, would they think that her promotion that was already on the way was because of that and not merit? And while rules about fraternization in Alliance marines were vague enough especially since his own status as a Council Spectre placed him outside of the chain of command he knew many who would frown upon their relationship. He had been thinking about this for a while and he still could not see a way out without hurting her or her career.

Shepard went to the coffee dispenser and finding his own special blend waited until the machine was done preparing it.

Ashley hearing the noise looked up.

"Hey Commander." she called to him, even now she called him either by rank or by surname as if calling him by his first name would have been some kind of step over the line too far.

"Ashley, still working?" he gestured towards the datapad

"Oh this, no, just writing to my sisters." she answered and grabbing her own cup walked over to him, stopping close enough so that he could smell her soap, she didn't use standard Alliance shower gel, instead she always seemed to have an old-style bar of soap, and he had to admit that it did smell better and he had felt cleaner after they shared a shower one time.

"Shepard, what's going on?" she asked worry lines creasing the corners of her eyes and mouth.

"Nothing, just tired." he said, telling her at least half the truth was better than nothing.

"That is not what I meant," she hesitated before continuing "you have been visiting Dr T'Soni more lately."

He knew of course what she was thinking, same thing that she had thought at the start, that he was attracted to Liara and now with their relationship straining she probably thought that he was seeing Liara on the side. It was of course his fault, after all he had been going to Liara's quarters and spending hours at a time there. At first it was simply conversation, mostly him asking questions about protheans, trying to understand the images in his head, trying to put them in context. But then they mind-medled it had been quicker than going over the information in a conversation, there were far too much information and concepts to pass on through conversation dozens of years of study by Liara, far too much cultural bias between asari and humans to explain. Some concepts rested too heavily on the asari way of thinking, asari culture.

"I have been using her knowledge to understand this." Shepard said as he tapped his forehead

"But didn't she already pass all that after Feros?"

"That was more like a reader's digest version. She had been studying them for longer than I have been alive after all and I needed more information to make sense of it."

Ashley shocked stepped back.

"But isn't that like sex for them? You have been going to her and letting her rummage around your head?" the way Ashley had said her was so full of accusation that Shepard winced despite himself.

"No, that's not it. C...Come here, let me explain" Shepard said and grabbing his mug of coffee led her to the table, remembering in time not to tell her to calm down. He knew the look on her face, he had seen it from other girls and it has never been a good idea to tell them to calm down.

"Asari mind meld can be two things, one is the one that they are known most for and that is to bridge their mind and nervous system to the mind and nervous system of their partner creating a complete joining, for a time they become one, that one is like sex, however the second one is where they attune it just enough to create a flow of information, in fact asari do it with close friends and family sharing a moment or a memory." he explained, trying to sound as detached as possible, Liara had melded with him enough times for him to understand the process, the stray memories that had leaked across also told him more about asari than anyone who wasn't dating one knew.

Asari were in fact quite similar to human women, they gave birth the same way, their "plumbing" worked similarly enough and while they could reproduce with species like elcor, hanar or volus, physical stimulation was far from unwelcome, in fact it made the whole process easier on the asari, skin to skin contact as well as the various hormones that flooded the system made it easier to create a joining.

"Plus Liara says that she can only see things in my mind that I actually focus on like the prothean message, so its been mostly her sharing her knowledge of protheans" Shepard concluded hoping that it will be enough.

"Mostly?" Ashley said still not completely ready to let it go.

"Sometimes if there is a strong memory associated with the particular bit of knowledge it leaks through, and anyway I see Liara as a sister, like a hundred year old little sister." he said

He could see that she still had doubts but she let it drop. She knew that the beacon had done more than just flash some images into his head, he had woken her enough times with his nightmares. It was one of the reasons why she was not sleeping in his quarters. Not all of them were about the Reapers. Elysium, what he had seen there and on the missions in the years after that raiding slaver bases, capturing pirate ships. She was twenty five, only four years younger but the black mark that made it hard for her to advance also had kept her safely away from things that made it hard to sleep at night. Eden Prime was the first true taste of that and she was coping quite well, taking down Saren helped as well as her occasional talks with Chakwas. And unlike him she had never ordered her people to die, Elysium and Kaidan were harsh lessons of command he wished she would not need to experience.

Ships intercom crackled and Joker's voice came through.

"We are approaching Amada system, dropping out of FTL in 15 minutes."

Shepard took Ashley's hand squeezed it reassuringly and stood up.

"Our intercom is supposed to be distortion free." Ashley said accepting that the conversation was over.

"Joker added it after the movie night, that old science fiction movie, and since its not against regs or at least any that I could find and no one seems to mind that particular alteration I decided to leave it be." Shepard said as he dropped his coffee cup into the washing rack.

"We are probably going to have to make a trip to the ground so get our gear ready, I hear Alchera is cold this time of year." he continued with a slight smile on his lips.

"Aye, Aye skipper" Ashley saluted and dropping her cup after his and hurried down into the armory.

Shepard went back to his quarters, they still felt too large, especially on a frigate but while the technical aspects of the ship were impressive it was still a prototype and most of the interior was design by committee, passageways and several of the compartments like the captains quarters were a waste of space while the crew had to do with the sleeping tubes or the various compartments squeezed in between all the shiny bits.

He sat down again, bringing up the intel on his terminal, reading through it for a tenth time and still marveling how much space a statement could take up that could have been said in one sentence. Did the intelligence types have some kind of special class in making these kinds of reports or was it some kind of defense mechanism, trying to cover their asses with paragraphs of useless intel just to make it clear that they were not sleeping on the job?

Satisfied that there was nothing remotely useful in the report he switched to the news broadcast that the ship had automatically downloaded at the last comm buoy, listening to it as he geared up in his N7 armour. There were tougher and admittedly better armor in the armory but this one was easier to move in than most and he had earned the right to wear it the hard way.

XO Pressly was doing most of the work handling the ship, Shepard while in command was not a navy officer but a marine and he was still in process of getting up to speed on how to run a ship.

As he managed to snap the last clasps into place the ship shuddered slightly as it dropped out of FTL.

Just as he was going out of his quarters the ship bucked, throwing him into the wall. Shepard managed to grab a handhold before the ship bucked again. With the alarms blaring he grabbed his helmet that was happily rolling around on the floor and put it on, heading towards the emergency beacon launch controls, right where the sleeping pods were. SSV Normandy was a good ship, an excellent ship but it was also meant mostly for stealth and scouting missions. Getting attacked right after FTL meant that they had been detected and Shepard doubted that anyone even Geth were crazy enough to attack then if they were outgunned.

Just as he managed to ready distress beacon for launch Ashley run up behind him

"Shepard!" she shouted as he sealed his helmet into place, the smoke coming from various bits of burning electronics was getting too thick to breath.

"Distress beacon is ready to launch."

"Will the alliance get here in time?"

"I am not doing this just so they can find our frozen corpses. Get everyone onto the escape pods" Shepard said as he grabbed a fire extinguisher

"Joker is still in the cockpit. He won't abandon ship. I am not leaving either."

"I need you to get the crew onto the escape pods. I'll take care of Joker" Shepard said and started walking away just as a gust of flame flared up in front of him

"Commander..." Ashley said hesitantly

"Ashley. Go. Now." he said emphasizing each word

"Aye, Aye" she replied and hurried away to help any leftover crew as Shepard brought his palm down on the holo button, jettisoning the emergency beacon.

Even though he saw the damage report on the screen, the real extent of it didn't register until Shepard picked his way through the crippled Normandy, fires all over the deck, overload making the capacitors explode, flinging debris right into his face, trying to shield his visor with his left hand he ascended the stairs to the upper deck where the top of the hull was just gone. The white-blue orb of Alchera, the planet they were supposed to investigate loomed above him. It seems the gravity had been disabled he noted as his mag boots activated sticking him to the deck forcing him into a slower pace as he made his way through the ruined CIC to the Joker's cockpit. The silence was worse than all those explosions, his own hard breathing and his heartbeat thundering in his ears. He had known moments like this before but this time it was worse, his own command, his ship, his people and there was nothing he could do.

"Come on Joker! We have to get out of here!"

"No! I won't abandon the Normandy! I can still save her!" Joker argued defiance in his voice

"Normandy is lost. Going down with the ship won't change that"

"Yeah, ok. Help me up" Joker relented as the beam started to cut into the hull again

Shepard grabbed Joker's arm a bit too forcefully making him exclaim in pain and helped him across the ruined deck to the nearest escape pod.

The beam hit something important throwing Shepard across the compartment but he managed to grab the wall with the escape pod controls on it. The beam was coming closer, slicing now in between the escape pod and him, the dying convulsions of the ship dislodging him again but not before he managed to hit the switch releasing the pod.

He felt himself being slammed against a bulkhead just before he was thrown clear of the ship out of the front half of the ship which had been sliced clear from the rest of the hull by the beam.

Bits and pieces of the Normandy were falling around them, the Alchera's gravity tugging at him too.

Some high velocity shrapnel had caught him in the back, slicing into the thinner lining where his suit connected to his helmet. His air was escaping and there was nothing he could do to stop it, but the suit's trauma module was not programmed for spacing it seemed, injecting every emergency drug it had in store, trying to keep him awake and alert as he plunged into the atmosphere. He could see his blood boil away into space as he felt himself growing weaker, unable to move the limbs.

He was still awake when the friction from the atmosphere heated him enough to start roasting him inside his own suit. Luckily most of the nerve endings have already died from exposure to vacuum and he was swimming in pain medication. Not that it helped him any, the dead nerve endings screamed in his brain, like hundred thousand needles being driven deep all over his body. It was then he noticed that he hasn't breathed in a while, a new agony, his lungs on fire, his whole body straining for that last bit of oxygenated blood, half of which had boiled away into space.

Mercifully that did not last long, darkness enveloping his mind, driving the pain away. Shepard felt grateful for that for a moment before the last vestiges of his consciousness faded away.