Mass Effect is BioWare's baby and toy box...I'm just sitting in the corner, having fun and making no money

'It's good to hear the Normandy made it Major.' Hackett's voice crackled over the comms as the QEC buzzed with interference. Specialist Traynor tutted, embarrassed and annoyed that she hadn't ironed out all the kinks in the entanglement like she said she would. Major Alenko had reassured her that as long as something got through, it was ok. Any word was better than no word at all.

It had been three days since the Normandy had literally fallen out of the sky on some unknown planet. The blast wave from the Crucible had hit the Normandy hard, it had fried a lot of the ships systems but worse than that, the energy wave had completely burnt out EDI. She just collapsed when the wave hit the ship in FTL and any and all attempts to resort power to her had met with failure. It had shocked the whole crew yet what had worried Major Alenko even more, but he hadn't said anything, was Liara's reports that her VI, Glyph, had stopped working too. Not to mention Garrus complaining about discomfort and lack of movement in parts of his face...namely the side in which he had taken a rocket too while on Omega, the side that he had cybernetics in. It didn't take a technical genius to put two and two together and come up with a pretty good explanation of why EDI had gone down.

What did you do Shepard? Was all Kaidan could think of at this news. But it was still early days and so he'd kept his thoughts to himself, rather than spook the crew, especially Joker...he was taking EDI's death hard.

'It's good to hear you're still alive too, Admiral.' Major Alenko replied crisply. 'We've been trying to raise anyone on our comms...but the buoys...it's like they're just not there anymore. And we can't raise Earth on the QEC either.'

Hackett's reply was stolen by static and everyone that was crammed into the comms room grew nervous. They were all in there for any shred of news of what had happened. Were the Reapers defeated? Did the fleet survive? Was Earth still standing? What had happened when the Crucible fired? And most importantly...was Shepard still alive?

'Can you repeat that Admiral?' Kaidan said, trying his best to keep his voice level.

'The comm buoys have been shorted out by the Crucible blast wave. They're damaged but intact. We've been fixing them as we find them Major, rebuilding the network to get the word out.'

'The word?' Liara butted in, anxious.

'That the Reapers have been destroyed.'

Everyone in the comms room cheered and the Admiral managed a smile to hear it. He'd heard similar things from every ship he'd managed to contact.

'But there's still much left to be done.' Hackett told them after the cheering had subsided. 'The energy released from the Crucible was intense and caused a lot of damage. Like with the comm buoys, the Relays have been damaged but our techs and engineers say they can be repaired, but it's going to take time.'

A hush fell over the comms room.

'We've also been getting reports that VIs have stopped working on the ships that have them and no one has been able to contact any geth ships. The few quarian ships we've managed to cross paths with have also reported failures in cybernetics amongst their people. Has the Normandy suffered any such failures?'

Kaidan cleared his throat, a little nervous of what to say, after all, EDI had been a full blown, unshackled AI. Although the Normandy crew had accepted her, he had no idea how much others knew of her existence. Plus, there were the feelings of the crew to consider too. Everyone had looked upon EDI has either a friend or a comrade; it would cheapen her life were he to be disrespectful.

'Yes Admiral, there had been.' Was all he chose to say.

Hackett nodded in a knowing fashion 'What is the Normandy's current status, Major?'

'The ship itself is more or less intact. The hull plates need to be repaired to make her space-worthy, but the inner hull itself hasn't been breached. A lot of our systems have been fried, but are repairable. But again, they're both going to take time, but we have a helluva crew here and the Normandy will be up and ready in no time.'

'Good, the sooner you can rejoin the fleet, the sooner we can get back to Earth.'

'Any news from Earth, Admiral?' Lieutenant Vega piped up.

'A little. The QEC on Earth is suffering from a similar interference problem as this one is...but the effect of the interference is much worse. Possibly due to its proximity to the Crucible blast. That's how we know the Reapers have been destroyed.'

'Has there been any word from Shepard?' Kaidan suddenly blurted out.

'No Major, there hasn't. She was aboard the Citadel when the Crucible was activated. Hell, she was the one that set it off. The Citadel almost blew itself apart when it fired.'

The room was silent for a moment, before a dry sob came from Tali.

'Do you think there's a chance she might've survived?' Kaidan asked the question everyone was thinking but his voice sounded hollow.

Hackett seemed to ponder the reply for a moment. Although the Admiral didn't know the complete ins and outs of the relationship between the Commander and Major Alenko, he had read the reports of the original Normandy mission and the fraternization that had gone on between them. He had also seen how the Commander had looked and spoken when she had reported that Major Alenko had been hurt on Mars. Then there was the rejection of his offer of a post in the fleet to Major Alenko in favour of serving aboard the Normandy.

'I don't know Major. The Citadel is in ruins and it's going to take teams weeks to dig through the rubble. If she somehow managed to survive the blast...I'm not sure she could hold out long enough for the rescue teams to get to her. I'm sorry.'

Kaidan said nothing, merely nodded.

'Get the Normandy back up and running Major, we need you and your crew back with us. We've got a galaxy to rebuild. Hackett out.'