Mass Effect 3 ending spoiler.

The world was nothing but exhaustion and pain. Somehow she found the strength to keep her legs moving, though she had no idea how. Every step was agony as she staggered forward, and every breath felt like a dagger piercing her side. Spinning around her, the world felt unreal – was she dying? Did she have but moments left to make her choice before her body succumbed to the battering it had taken? She had to hold on; everyone relied on her. Now, more than ever before, the fate of the galaxy lay in her hands. Her burnt, aching hands.

Behind her stood the vision of the boy she had seen so many times in her nightmares. Representing all her failures, he had haunted her during every moment of silence and solitude she'd had since she'd seen him die. The moment she had seen the apparition, something had clenched deep in her chest, something intangible that she did not want to put to words. Mute now, he stared at her, waiting.

The choice was hers alone. So much of what he had said to her was already lost – all she could think about was those who would suffer if she chose to destroy all artificial life to eliminate the reapers. How could she condemn EDI, the geth? They were not organic, but they still had life. Metal joints and servos were their muscle and bone, bits of code, their DNA. Didn't they deserve to live? How could she deny them that?

Then again, maybe she just hadn't the strength in her limbs to climb those steps, and the word peace echoed in her mind like a loop of code, repeating over and over. Almost of their own accord, her feet carried her forward towards the towering pillar of light, towards the salvation of the galaxy and the surcease of her suffering. Towards the end of –

Garrus.

A loud noise filled her ears. Something was very wrong. She stood on the ledge, one foot already suspended over the chasm in front of her. Before she could correct her forward motion, she lost her balance and toppled into the beam.

Except... instead of more agony, it was over. Still in pain, she was half buried under rubble and what she suspected was a dead body. She found herself staring up into the blinding light of a massive explosion that spread across the sky. Thousands of tons of metal groaned, there was a horrible crash, and the earth rumbled beneath her. A reaper had fallen.

With her senses overwhelmed, she closed her eyes and drifted back into blessed unconsciousness.

"Commander?"

No. It was nice there in the darkness. It was comfortable and safe; she didn't want to listen to the voice. The reapers were gone from her mind for the first time in years, and she wanted to hold onto that blessing. The destruction around her could wait. Hadn't she earned some peace?

"Shepard?" Now it sounded more like a plea. In her limited awareness she could not tell who it was who spoke to her.

Leavemealone.

"Shepard – Merryn!"

Nobody called her that. When her eyes fluttered open, she saw a gray, tattooed face marked with scars. Both blue and red blood were spattered across the turian's features. Garrus. Garrus had called her by her name, though no more than once or twice.

"Garrus," she said. Her voice came out as a croak. "Is... is it over?"

The turian reached out and brushed hair, bloody and sticky, out of her eyes. "Yes. You did it, Shepard. We though you were gone, but you came back through the Conduit before it exploded. It's over."

She let out a heavy sigh. "Finally," she said.

"Well, except for the mess," Garrus said. He turned to look over his shoulder. "I think you're going to need a pretty big broom."

The next few years went by in a blur. The reconstruction of worlds across the galaxy would continue for a long while. Most colony worlds had been abandoned altogether, with their inhabitants scattered or dead, their buildings destroyed, and not enough resources to go around, it wasn't worth it. The mass relays had been repaired, at least. After having grown familiar with ancient technology, the thousands of experts who had come together to build the Crucible had gotten together and had achieved what many had thought impossible.

Shepard was a hero – the savior of the galaxy. Everyone knew her name; everyone knew her face. She was revered and regarded with awe everywhere she went. After the reapers had been defeated she had remained with Alliance Command to assist with the recovery efforts, and the worship she was the object of was unnerving. When they had offered her retirement with full honors, she had not hesitated to accept.

Unwilling to face the rest of the galaxy, she had chosen to find a remote location on Earth where she could enjoy her peace with Garrus. That wasn't to say that she never traveled anywhere ever again, but she'd had enough of outer space to last several lifetimes. Even though she'd grown up on ships, Earth was her real home.

Merryn reached out and slid her hand across the sand beside her. Curling her fingers, she scooped up a delicate scallop seashell and held it up in the sunlight. Purple veins of color fanned out from the base, and her eyes traveled across the shell's smooth curves. There was so much beauty in the galaxy, most especially in simple things such as this.

"What's that one called?" Garrus asked, looking over at her.

She turned the shell over to study the inside, then handed it to him. "It's a scallop shell."

The mandibles on either side of Garrus's mouth fluttered in curiosity as he looked it over. "A rather attractive object," he said, handing it back to her.

Merryn stood up, and slipped it into a pocket, staring out across the water. "Mordin would have liked it."

The gentle lapping of waves washing across the sand was all that answered her.

Merryn never got sick. The synthetic implants fused to her skeleton and laced throughout her tissues bolstered her immune system and kept her free of disease. When the winter sniffles spread through the rest of population, she suffered none of it. Doctors suspected that her lifespan would exceed that of a normal human by half again as much.

She would give it up in a heartbeat to be spared this.

Garrus's breathing was labored as he lay on the hospital bed beside her, and she could see how difficult it was for him to keep his eyes open to look at her. The skin between the metallic plates covering his body was dark blue with fever and illness, and Merryn ran her fingers gently across it, over his face and down his neck.

On the far side of the room behind her, their two adopted children stood, silent in their shared grief. They had a krogan son who they had fostered, as his people recovered from the genophage. They also had a human daughter – a girl born a few years after the war ended, orphaned by plague on a recovering colony world.

Leaning over, she kissed the his forehead. "Love," she whispered.

Garrus turned his head towards her. A smile ghosted the corners of his mouth as he lifted a hand to tap a talon on what passed for his lips. "Don't hold out on me, Commander." Weary amusement danced in his eyes. With an attempt at a smile – for his sake – she obeyed, and gave him a gentle kiss where he'd indicated. "That's better," he said with an already-weaker voice.

"Garrus-"

The turian shook his head, and coughed. "It's all right. Not exactly a hero's death, but I think all the extra years in the bedroom make up for it."

Trying not to laugh, she rested her forehead against his. "Is that what you want to be remembered for?"

"Oh, I think there are worse things."

A few moments of silence passed between them. Garrus nibbled at her cheek. "Hey, Shepard." His voice was closer to a whisper.

"Yeah?"

"I'll wait for you at the bar. You know... up there."

"You still buying?" She almost choked on the words.

Garrus smiled at her. "Yeah, why not? And-" he coughed again.

"I'll never be alone?"

"Never."

It was far too long without him before her body finally succumbed to age and her soul to weariness. Still, she'd had her children, and grandchildren, and great-grandchildren, and she had never been alone. She had so many regrets, but there had been moments of joy and periods of happiness, and she felt glad to have lived despite everything.

When death at last took her, she was sitting in a comfortable seat in the starboard observation room on the latest ship to bear the name Normandy. She had been invited for its christening as an honored guest. Ceremonies had never appealed to her, but she was willing to humor them – this once.

The last thing she saw was the expanse of stars out the window, containing all the worlds and all the people she had helped to save so many years earlier.

Pain. Blinding light. None of it had been real. The life flashing before her eyes had been a life not yet lived, a life that would never be lived.

She was already toppling towards her death. It was too late – too late for too many things, especially too late to stop this. A scream ripped from her throat for half a second before the fire consumed her whole.

Then there was nothing.