Day three, 1300 hours

"Immediate assistance to room five! Hurry!"

An ear-splitting alarm blared over the voice on the intercom as the facility manager and supervisor burst out into the corridor – the manager cursing that he hadn't finished his sandwich – and raced toward room five, just as they had an hour earlier. The facility's newest patient was proving to be a real handful, but the staff was determined not to give up on this very special subject.

He was a living legend, after all.

"Worker injured! Everyone out!" the female voice shrieked over the intercom, and the two men who'd had their lunch break interrupted picked up their pace, arriving at room five just as the emergency doors came down, trapping their latest acquisition within.

"Bastard broke it!" one of the workers complained, blood oozing through his fingers as he held onto his nose like it was about to fall off.

"You've had worse from shaving, Scot," his female co-worker scoffed and then, noticing the two new arrivals into the room, she straightened up, as did the rest of the staff.

"What happened this time?" demanded the supervisor, stepping closer to the two-way mirror which afforded him and his staff a view of their patient, who glared back at them with eyes like glowing coals.

Scot's partner, Octavia, sighed and rolled her shoulders. "We tried to take his food in, sir. He accused us of poisoning it and said he'd rather starve than perform like a 'fucking circus animal' for us. Scot made a joke and then the guy just went berserk and started lashing out at us." She glanced at the window and shivered before turning away. "I can't even look at him. His eyes… those scars… talk about creepy. How did he end up like that?"

"His state of mind, stress, among other things," answered the manager before everyone jumped back as the patient lunged for the window and started pounding it with his fists.

"You think I don't know you're watching me?" he yelled, eyes aflame with fury. "You think I don't know who you are? How long do you think you'll be able to keep me here? The Alliance will come for me, and when they do, they'll tear through your fat asses like tissue paper! And I can't wait to see that!"

The supervisor shook his head before activating the intercom. "Commander Shepard, as we keep explaining, we are Alliance-"

"Bullshit!" raged the patient. "You're Cerberus, every last one of you!"

"There is no Cerberus! You finished it!" the supervisor argued. "The Illusive Man is dead – you shot him on the Crucible. Do you remember telling Admiral Hackett?" he asked, softening his voice a little.

"No! You put that in my head!" accused the commander, spittle flying from his mouth and adhering to his chin. "You're trying to make me crazy because you want to study me! I'm special because you couldn't indoctrinate me! Well, you just keep it up, because people are on their way here and you're all gonna die! Study that!" he ranted before arranging his hand into the shape of a gun and pointing it at the two-way mirror. "Bam! That one's for Anderson! And this one's for Chambers! And this one's for Williams! I've got a bullet right here for every one of you murdering bastards!"

The manager cut off the audio. "This isn't working," he said impatiently, turning to the other workers. "Take a break," he ordered. "And get that nose fixed up, Scot."

The workers filed out of the room, leaving the two men alone. They watched as the deranged commander renewed his assault on the mirror, and noted that their patient's hands had started to bleed.

"He's gonna break the screen, or one of his hands. Release compound RS-757 into room five, fifteen parts per trillion," ordered the manager, and a light winked on the console in front of them before a hissing sound was heard.

Gradually, Shepard's movements slowed and he shook his head before clutching it and staggering to his bed, where he slumped onto his belly, one arm and leg hanging over the edge. "Pussies!" he rasped into the pillow.

"We'd better get in there before he suffocates or drowns in his own drool, sir," said the supervisor dryly.

The manager nodded. "All right. One more try, and if we have no luck, we'll move on to stage two. We need to start getting results, quickly. This is Shepard, for god's sake."

~o~O~o~

Day three, 1430 hours

His eyes slowly opened and the first things he saw were the two floating white masks, as he had yesterday, and the day before. Well, those masks would get as much information out of him today as they had on previous days.

"You are Commander John Shepard," said the smaller of the men, whom Shepard had deduced was the manager, as the other man called him 'Sir'.

"You gonna tell me your names? Your real names?" the commander slurred, and the two men looked at each other.

"We've already told you," the manager replied calmly, "but you heard something different – what your mind wanted you to believe."

"Right." Shepard snorted and rolled his eyes. "Tell me again. Maybe my crazy, fucked-up brain will process it correctly this time."

The manager nodded and released a quiet sigh. "All right… my name is Harbinger and this is my colleague, Leviathan."

Shepard laughed derisively. "Whatever. Play your little games. I'm remembering every second of this. You're gonna pay. Big time."

"Commander, we're going to be straight with you," began the supervisor.

"Oh, really? Straight? You give me false names. I can't see your faces. You've masked your voices. How the hell is that being straight with me?"

"Your vision's blurred because of the sedative we had to release into your room after you attacked our staff again," answered the supervisor. "You can't hear our voices properly because we're wearing masks so that we don't inhale the sedative. We haven't given you false names. We've been over this. We're trying to help you."

"Then let me go. Simple."

The manager shook his head. "It's not simple at all. You're mentally unfit and have been sent here for treatment. This is a dedicated Alliance facility. We deal with PTSD, Combat Stress, alcoholism, drug addiction and various other trauma-induced conditions. We have a ninety-six percent success rate. We're the best there is."

"Well, I don't have any of those things," Shepard drawled, woozy from the effects of the sedative. "So what the hell am I doing here?"

The manager – or Harbinger as he called himself – sighed and ventured a quick glance at his colleague. "I don't know if you're ready to hear this yet, but we've tried our best to keep you safe and comfortable here, and we've attempted standard therapy without success. If you'll listen, Commander, I'm going to tell you the truth."

Shepard closed his eyes and said nothing.

The manager cleared his throat. "We've determined that, during your campaign against the Reapers and your attempts to assemble the fleets, you were indoctrinated-"

"Like hell!" growled Shepard, struggling to move but he found he couldn't because he was tied to the bed. "So Cerberus – puppet of the Reapers – is telling me that the Reapers indoctrinated me? What kind of half-baked crap is that?"

"Commander!" interrupted the supervisor, his tone sharp. "You need to listen! Do you want to spend the rest of your days arguing with us, angry, frustrated and jacked up on drugs? Because we don't want that for you! You're a goddamn hero to us and everyone you fought to save on Earth! We want to see you get better but we can't do anything while you continue to fight us! We're not the enemy here!"

"All right," muttered the manager, touching the supervisor's arm. "Let's all calm down here. Commander. We have irrefutable proof that you were indoctrinated by the Reapers. Cerberus knew this and used it against you. We'll show you the proof if you want. You chose to destroy the Reapers and when your connection with them was severed, you suffered a psychotic break. Cerberus and the Reapers were so deeply entrenched in your mind that when the Reapers were destroyed it was too much, and your mind detached itself from reality as a coping mechanism. Your delusions that we are working for Cerberus and name ourselves after Reapers are also part of that coping mechanism."

"Your mind has created a new reality," explained the supervisor. "Cerberus's attempts to indoctrinate you were so gradual, so insidious, that the sudden withdrawal-"

"Get your story straight before you try it out on me," Shepard snapped. "If I was indoctrinated, why the fuck would I destroy the reapers? And you think I'm crazy?"

"But you did destroy them," answered the manager.

"Yeah. Which means no indoctrination. Quit wasting my time. I'm done with this." Shepard again closed his eyes.

"Well, that's the amazing thing," the manager said with admiration in his voice. "Somehow, despite everything the Reapers and Cerberus did to you – which I'll remind you we have evidence of – you managed to fight it, to do the right thing when it counted. We've reviewed the transcript of your debriefing, and found several instances of attempts at indoctrination within. Electronic devices were found on board the Normandy, and are still being studied. Cerberus did its utmost to fully indoctrinate you but it didn't quite work. Either that, or it did work and you're the first person to break the control Cerberus, and the Illusive Man, had over you."

"Commander, we'd like to show you that evidence," offered the supervisor. "We believe it'll help you adjust to reality – true reality, and not the one your mind has manufactured."

"I said we're done here," the commander said through gritted teeth and, despite further attempts from the other two men to get him to talk, Shepard refused to utter another word.

~o~O~o~

"I guess it's stage two, then," decided the manager once they'd left Shepard's room.

"Hey, look on the bright side – this is the part of the plan we were most optimistic about," the supervisor replied as they walked along the corridor to finish their lunch. "We bring in a couple of his friends, the ones he trusts the most."

"I think I know just the people. No more than two for now." They reached the staff room and took a seat at a table.

"Absolutely. And I think I know which two you mean," said the supervisor with a smile. "Someone who's been with him right from the start, has never let him down and has been to hell and back with him."

"Yeah," nodded the manager, also smiling. "Plus, someone who was there during the final assault – also someone Shepard's grown very close to. He might not have been there from the beginning, or on the SR-1, but Shepard trusts him completely and they've spent almost every waking moment together during the last several months."

"I agree." The supervisor rose and grabbed a coffee before joining the manager, who was finishing off his sandwich. "Should we tell him, or just bring them in?"

The manager considered that for a minute before shrugging. "I think we should tell him they're here and then send them in right away. Hopefully seeing them will be like a slap across the face to him – in a positive sense."

"He was a lot calmer with us this time," the supervisor observed. "You think we're getting through to him?"

"I hope so. We can't fail on this. He is not going to be one of the four percent."

A thoughtful silence fell and the two men quietly finished their lunch before rising and heading for the exit.

"And what if he doesn't respond to seeing his friends?" asked the supervisor. "Or doesn't believe it's really them?"

"Yeah. I was hoping you wouldn't ask that. We'd better be ready for anything."

~o~O~o~

Day three, 1700 hours

"Commander Shepard," said Scot via the intercom, and the commander made an obscene gesture with his finger at the two-way mirror. "I wanted to say thank you for not trying to bust my nose this time. As a treat, we've brought in a couple of friends for you."

"Visitors?" Shepard snorted. "Who? The Illusive Man's ghost? The Reaper child? It didn't work the first time. What makes you think it will again?"

"Uh… no, Commander. I'll just send them in. Please try not to… well, they've been waiting a long time to see you. Try to be nice to them, okay?"

Shepard sprang up and approached the two-way mirror. "You don't tell me who to be nice to – I decide that. And, as you obviously don't know, I don't have any friends. You don't assemble a fleet comprised of sworn enemies by being nice to people. So I'd really like to see who these so-called 'friends' are."

"Well, why don't we just-"

"I'm getting real tired of hearing your voice, Scot," sneered the commander. "Go ahead and send in your clowns. But don't expect me to perform for you."

With a quiet sigh, Scot worked the console and the door to Shepard's room slid open. The commander turned away from the two-way mirror and stared at his visitors without speaking as they cautiously entered, staying close to the door.

"Hey, Commander," Joker said quietly. When Shepard didn't answer, Joker quickly glanced at James Vega, who stood beside him, before speaking again. "Uh… nice place you got here. White. Never seen so many shades of white in one place before."

Shepard remained quiet and stony-faced as James took a few steps inside and looked around. "How you holding up, Loco?" he asked casually.

"I told you before, no nicknames, Lieutenant," Shepard replied sternly, folding his arms. "I shouldn't have to repeat myself."

James snorted and pulled out one of the chairs at the table before turning it backwards and sitting on it. "See?" he said to Joker. "What'd I tell you? Nothing wrong with him."

"Okay, Commander… I'm gonna sit down," said Joker, slowly moving to the table. "Just promise not to go on a murderous rampage or anything? 'Cause that'd kinda suck after surviving the Collectors and the Reapers."

He sat opposite James at the table and both men studied the commander, who stared back at them, suspicion in his eyes. "What are you doing here?" Shepard asked them. "And where is here? They claim I've been here for three days but I don't remember anything before today."

"Well, apparently we're the closest you have to friends," answered James. "You can be kind of a dick, sir, but we're here. Nobody forced us to come."

"And to answer your second question," Joker added, "this is the Alliance nuthouse."

James scowled at Joker and shook his head. "It's a hospital. They deal with, you know, mental issues. People who have breakdowns and stuff."

"Yeah, like I said," muttered Joker, rolling his eyes.

"I didn't have a goddamn breakdown," asserted the commander.

Joker sighed and rested his chin on his fist. "Yes, you did. We saw the vid-"

"Vids can be doctored, Joker."

"It wasn't doctored," the pilot replied in exasperation. "You lost it during your debriefing with Admiral Hackett. He was asking you questions and we could see that you were getting pissed, ya know? Then you just… you just started whaling on him. Lucky his bodyguards were there to pull you off of him. What the hell happened, Commander? What did he say to set you off?"

"Whatever they've shown you is a lie," Shepard insisted in a harsh tone. "I didn't attack Hackett because I didn't survive that long. I was caught in the Reaper's sights just before I reached the beam – you tend to remember that kind of shit."

"Oh, so we're all sitting around in heaven, debating whether or not you're insane?" James scoffed, his brow wrinkling when Shepard's expression turned distinctly hostile. "All accounts show that you narrowly avoided the Reaper's laser – it hit something else and you were caught on the edge of the blast. You survived long enough to reach the beam and transport to the Crucible."

"What accounts?" Shepard barked. "The entire fleet was decimated! So I missed the journalist taking cover behind a pile of dead bodies to capture that crucial moment? Oh, yeah – I missed it because I was dead."

"The fleet wasn't decimated, Commander!" James shot back. "Hammer, absolutely. No question. But about a third of the main fleet survived. And how can you be here if you're dead?"

"I was dead. They did something to me," hissed Shepard, jabbing at his temple. "Cerberus put me back together once and they've done it again. There is no way I survived that blast. There is no way I reached the Crucible. Think about it! I get torn apart in the blast, but somehow make it to the beam, kill the Illusive Man, talk with some… some ghost child and calmly and rationally discuss a new solution to the Reaper threat? That's far-fetched even for Cerberus!"

"Commander, you told Hackett that was what happened!" Joker exclaimed.

"I told him that because it was all I could remember, but I've had time to think!" Shepard replied heatedly, his eyes glinting. "That was what Cerberus wanted me to believe. They planted it in my head, and by the sound of it, they planted it in yours, too! I can't believe you swallowed their bullshit!"

James leaned forward in his chair and pointed at the commander. "If none of that happened, then how did you destroy the Reapers?"

"I don't know! I don't have all the answers, okay? And what's with all the questions? You're as bad as-" He stopped dead, his chest heaving, his face drained of colour. "Of course," he muttered to himself. "The questions, the acceptance of Cerberus's spiel… you're indoctrinated!"

"Oh, man," James groaned, shaking his head and giving Shepard a pitying look.

"Seriously?" Joker contended. "From what I hear, you're the one who's indoctrinated. And this paranoid shit you're spewing is doing nothing to persuade us otherwise. You need help, Commander. And this is the best place to get it."

"I didn't mean you," Shepard said to Joker before turning to James. "You… Cortez… Traynor… you were the only ones I wasn't sure of, didn't know well enough… you could have been working for Cerberus the whole time! It all makes sense now!"

"Hey, that's enough!" James yelled, jumping to his feet and slamming his palm against the table. "Say what you want about me but Esteban – my friend? Is still MIA, if you even care! And did you ask how Hackett is after you beat on him? The rest of the crew? You know EDI's dead, right? You ever consider any of that while you're living in this fucked-up fantasy world of yours?"

"You're the one living in a fantasy created by Cerberus! I did not beat on Hackett!" Shepard raged, and Joker also stood up, clasping James's arm to steady himself.

"Let's go," he said sadly. "I don't think we can help him, James."

"You're not going anywhere," Shepard ordered, moving to the table and stopping a foot in front of James. "You're going to give me some answers, Lieutenant. What are you and Cerberus trying to pull, here? Were you trying to indoctrinate me the whole time, even when you were my bodyguard? I told you things back then that nobody else knows! I trusted you, you bastard!"

He staggered back as James's fist slammed into his nose and, enraged, he launched himself at the brawny marine, his hands closing around James's throat. "The truth, Lieutenant!" he bellowed.

James grabbed at Shepard's hands in a desperate attempt to loosen the commander's grip. "I-I'll… gyark! Break your f-fucking…ack!"

"Commander!" Joker yelled. "Hey, someone! We need help in here!" Realising that no one was coming to his immediate aid, Joker hurriedly limped to the fighting men and forced himself between them. "Quit it! You want to kill each other?"

"Stay out of this, Joker!" Shepard commanded and he tried to push the pilot away with his elbow, but caught the other man on the cheek and Joker backpedalled in a daze, almost falling over a chair, but he grabbed a nearby bulkhead at the last second.

"Damnit, Commander!" he complained fiercely, clutching his chest and gasping as he stabilised himself. "What the hell, man? I almost fell! I know you're messed up, but I'd like to keep my spine in one piece, all right? Jesus!"

Horrified by the thought of what could have happened, Shepard temporarily relaxed his grip on James and then nausea and pain flared in his head as the lieutenant butted him between the eyes and shoved him hard against a wall. Shepard reached out and found something to steady himself on and, when the pain had receded, he opened his eyes in time to see the doors opening and James assisting Joker through the door.

"Joker," Shepard croaked, feeling like he was about to throw up. "Joker, I'm-"

"We're done!" James shouted hoarsely with a hateful look at the commander as he rubbed his neck. "You've always been a cold son of a bitch but I was still proud to serve with you. Now…I'm ashamed. Good luck with the craziness thing. Hope that works out for you." He turned his back and wrapped a supporting arm around Joker's waist as the facility staff brought the doors down.

"Wait!" Shepard blurted, a hitch in his voice. He slumped onto his bed, head in hands. He remained there, his posture sagging, for a few minutes before he scrubbed his face and looked at the two-way mirror. "Is anyone there?" he asked unsteadily. "Tell him… them… I'm sorry. No… just Joker. Or… I-I don't know. I… don't know what's real anymore. I don't know who to believe. This has gone far enough."

On the other side of the mirror, Scot cut off the audio and looked at the manager and supervisor, who stood beside him. "A breakthrough?" he asked his superiors.

"We'll see." The supervisor leaned forward and touched the intercom. "What do you want us to do, Commander? You've resisted all our attempts to help you. You've attacked not only our staff but your own friends as well. What do you want? How exactly are we supposed to help you?"

"I… I wanna see the evidence."

"Evidence of what?"

"You said you had evidence that I was indoctrinated. I… wanna see it. I need to make sense of this. What's going on in my head."

The manager and supervisor shared a tentative smile, and the manager leaned in close to the intercom. "Are you going to be open-minded about this, Commander, or have you already decided that we've fabricated the whole thing?" he asked.

"What the hell do you care? Just show me the damn thing!" Shepard ordered.

The manager once again severed the comm link. "I'll take that," he said to his colleagues.

~o~O~o~

Day three, 1900 hours

"So, where are the Reapers?" Shepard asked as he was wheeled into a room he'd never seen before, which was filled with monitors.

"You mean Leviathan and Harbinger?"

Shepard craned his neck and looked over his shoulder at Scot, who put the brakes on the commander's wheelchair and checked the buckles on his straightjacket. "You call them that as well?"

Scot looked confused for a second. "Call them what? Ah. I guess you're still hearing what you want to hear, Commander."

"Aren't you getting tired of all these games?" Shepard demanded, struggling against his bonds. "And is this really necessary?"

Scot pulled up a small chair and placed it next to the commander, sitting down upon it and clasping his hands together. "I'm afraid it is. You can't be sedated in here because you need to be clear-headed to watch these vids. And, well, we can't quite trust you yet." He sighed and touched his nose, which was not broken but was badly bruised. "I don't take any pleasure in seeing you like this, Commander. Hell, I owe my life to you. Every one of us does. And I take no pleasure in what I'm about to show you. This isn't going to be easy for you to see. I'm… sorry, sir."

"You're a hell of an actor, Scot, I'll give you that," replied Shepard with a dubious look at the other man. "So, where are they?"

"If you're referring to Harbinger and Leviathan, they have other patients to attend to."

"So you're trying to indoctrinate other Alliance personnel? For what purpose?"

Scot groaned and rubbed his eyes. "Commander… actually, I shouldn't even be calling you that. We're doing it out of respect."

"Why shouldn't you be calling me that?"

"Because you've been temporarily relieved of duty on medical grounds. Your Spectre status has also been revoked, pending the outcome of your treatment."

Shepard laughed, not sure why he was doing so, but realised it was the first time he'd done so in several days, possibly weeks. "So I'm just plain old Mr. Shepard, huh?"

Scot shrugged. "Pretty much, at least until you're declared fit for duty. But… if you don't mind, I'll still call you Commander. It doesn't feel right otherwise."

Shepard frowned and silently remonstrated himself for finding Scot a pretty decent guy. He wasn't. He was Cerberus and he worked for two men who named themselves after Reapers but made out that they didn't. Scot – if that was even his real name – was anything but decent.

"Let's get this over with," Shepard grumbled, refusing to meet the other man's eyes.

Scot nodded once and activated his omni-tool. At the same time, each monitor flickered into life, displaying a paused vid of Shepard and Admiral Hackett sitting at a conference table in a large room.

"Yes, Commander," answered Scot.

Thank you for reading!