"Shepard!" Joker yelled as the Collector ship's blast ripped through the Normandy.
The artificial gravity finally gave out and Shepard lost his footing. Before he floated away he was able to hit the launch button for Joker's escape pod. His last thought before another blast bounced him off the walls into space was that at least his crew made it to safety.
The blast caused him to temporarily lose consciousness. When he came back around he was drifting towards the surface of Alchera and his suit had ruptured, leaking the air he so desperately needed. He franticly tried to cover the breaches with his hands only to have two more open up on his back. He flailed futilely trying to cover three holes with two hands.
His oxygen quickly ran out and he stopped flailing as his strength faded and he came to accept his fate. Not only was he running out of air and about to reenter Alchera's atmosphere but any emergency rescue ships from the Alliance would be hours away.
Oxygen deprivation set in and he became delirious. Visions from his life started playing across his mind's eye like a slideshow. He saw pictures of his childhood. His mother and father were both in the Alliance. They took him all over the galaxy with them, getting posted on different colonies or ships. He enjoyed what time he could get with them but the constant moving around never really allowed for long term friends or relationships. He was very outgoing and personable and thus made friends quickly. He had to, to savor the short time he would have with them.
At 18 he followed in his parents footsteps and joined the Alliance. The visions slowed as they focused on that first company of soldiers he had the honor of commanding. In his life of short flings and temporary acquaintances, that first band of brothers were the first he could call real friends. They laughed together, joked together, fought together, and on one occasion cried together when Johnny lost his life to a Batarian slaver's bullet on Elysium. The same mission propelled Shepard's reputation throughout the Alliance fleet.
His visions graciously sped through the mission on Akuze, the planet were he lost all his men and a piece of himself. He changed after that mission. No longer was he the charismatic and courageous leader of the best damn company in the Alliance fleet. He became a ruthless dictator with only the mission's success in mind and nothing else. Not his life or anyone else's. He proved that when he threw three-quarters of an elite strike team at a heavily defended bunker on Torfan. They were all slaughtered just to open up a weak point in their defenses so the rest of his team could get in and route out the remaining defenders. The leaders in the bunker attempted to use their slaves as hostages but Shepard killed them all, claiming the prisoners were dead when he got there.
His own father died during the fleet's assault on the bunker but he didn't even show for the funeral as he was immediately shipped out for another mission. His mission success rate was the highest of any commanding officer and on missions of high difficulty.
That's why they made him a Spectre.
"Udina, you can't be serious?"
"That's Ambassador Udina, Captain Anderson, and I am always serious."
"I've seen men like him before. He's self-destructive. He's changed ever since that mission to Akuze. Sure he was top of the academy and a war hero because of his service during the Blitz but he doesn't care about his life or the lives of his team."
"He lost most of his men in that siege on Torfan and many more since."
"You lost more than that sending the fleet to bombard the bunker Admiral Hackett. And your right Captain Anderson, all he cares about is the mission. He has the highest mission success rate of any commanding officer on missions of extreme difficulty and those that serve under him come back stronger because of it."
"Those that don't go insane or AWOL…"
"The point is he gets things done no matter the cost which is what Spectre's do."
"Fine, but I will have nothing to do with this decision."
"Good, because you don't. Shepard and a Turian Spectre named Nihlus will accompany you to Eden Prime. The Spectre will evaluate Shepard's skills to see if he worthy of the Spectre status. From now on he will represent the human race."
"God help us."
The memories paused as Shepard saw a beam from the unknown vessel finally slice through the Normandy. The kinetic barriers holding the atmosphere in the ship gave way and the beam ignited the remaining air in one fiery explosion.
As if on cue, a flood of visions flowed into his mind. And again they slowed to a series of home movies from his perspective as something good entered his life. Even reality seemed to give pause, mid-explosion, as if the explosion were a dream and the visions reality.
The crew of the SSV Normandy. Together, they helped change him. Change him back into the man he was before Akuze.
The first to flit through his consciousness was Kaiden Alenko. He was a good lieutenant and a better person. Born and trained as a Biotic, he was always treated differently and with suspicion. He never let that change who he was though. He always did what he thought was right and was loyal to a fault. Shepard took it hard when he sacrificed himself to detonate the nuke on Virmire. Shepard went after Ashley and the STG team she had lead to the AA guns, telling himself he should save as many lives as possible. He also had a hunch Saren would show up and Shepard wanted him as far from the nuke as possible. He trusted Kaiden to defend the bomb against a few geth. He rationalized the whole decision, but it still weighed heavy on his heart, a feeling unknown to him just a few months before.
Next was Ashley Williams, a tomboy with a surprisingly feminine interest in the literary arts. A lot about Ashley surprised him which is what drew him to her initially. He quickly realized it wouldn't work between them and hoped she did too. They were both too similar, too broken. A relationship would only end in more pain and he tried to keep things professional. When Kaiden died and memories long repressed surfaced, Ashley came to comfort him and he could not put together an adequate defense. They shared a night together that he both loved and regretted. Now he would never know if it would work.
He also remembered his conversations with Garrus Vakarian, a Turian and member of C-Sec until Shepard found him. He was tired of C-Sec getting in the way of bringing justice to those that deserved it and joined Shepard thinking his status allowed him so supersede law and morals. As Shepard changed he grew to despise what he was and what Garrus was becoming. Garrus was turning into the man he was trying to get away from…the man that walked away from Akuze…the man that put the mission before everything. As they both looked down their barrels at Dr. Saleon, every fiber in Shepard's being told him to pull the trigger but he couldn't. He lowered his gun and told Garrus to do the same. Shepard ended up shooting the doctor as he reached for a weapon but he knew he had changed and had saved Garrus from turning into the monster Shepard once was. Without revenge eating away at his conscience, Garrus finally understood what Shepard was saying. You didn't have to be a monster to kill one.
Then there was Wrex, a Krogan of the Urdnot clan. They nearly came to blows when they meet because of their differing views on the Salarian's genophage but they also respected each other's prowess as warriors. Whenever they fought together they constantly challenged each other to do better. Their animosity turned to friendship when Shepard helped Wrex recover a family heirloom. At first he saw the Krogan like other species; as barbarians that needed to be crippled by the genophage or they would rampage throughout the galaxy. After his time with Wrex he realized that such a plague had devastated them deeper than most could tell but he still had mixed feelings as to whether it was right or not.
Liara T'soni was next though she was the last to join. She was dragged into the conflict because her mother was working for Saren though not of her own free will. Shepard regretted taking her on the mission to Noveria. He hoped seeing her daughter would change the Matriarch's mind but the indoctrination of Sovereign ran deep. It pained him to have to be the one to kill Liara's mother but she left him no choice. And when Liara grieved he kept his distance. She thought she was falling in love with him but he played it off as a simple crush since she was nothing more than a teenager in Asari terms. Asari could meld their minds with another species and, though Shepard never admitted it, he didn't want Liara seeing anymore of his mind than she already had. He was afraid that if she saw all he had done, what he was, it would break more than her heart. She was too pure and innocent to corrupt with the specters of his past.
His mind finally settled and lingered the longest on the last crew member, a Quarian engineer, Tali'Zorah nar Rayya. She had found evidence that marked Saren as a rogue Spectre convincing the Council to let Shepard bring him in or bring him down. Her courage and ingenuity bought her enough time for Shepard, Wrex, and Garrus to show up and save her from Saren's assassins. After hearing of Shepard's mission, she saw the importance of it and asked to join, forgoing the continuation of her Pilgrimage, to protect the galaxy. As they talked aboard the Normandy, Shepard found her selfless nature and optimistic attitude naïve, even silly at times. He expected the harsh reality of battle to break her spirit but she never faltered. She continued to act only for those around her which Shepard came to respect, and then admire. It is the reason he did not hesitate to give her a copy of the data they found on the geth in a hidden base even though it was technically confidential Alliance data. Only now that he was drifting through space towards his death did he realize that she was the main reason for his change of heart. He led his team by example to be better soldiers. She led him by example to be a better commander and a better person. If only he had a second chance to tell her.
As the increasing G's mercifully sent his mind into unconsciousness before he felt the pain of asphyxiation or the burn of reentry, he looked towards the horizon. Maybe it was a hallucination or maybe it was from the haze of burning atmosphere around him. But his addled mind thought it saw that first company of men, of friends, appear in the building light. They were all standing together, shoving and joking around like they were getting ready for a picture. Just before Shepard's vision went completely black, they all seemed to turn towards him and wave in welcome.
If you can't tell, I messed with the time line a bit and gave Shepard all three psychological profiles. It will make things interesting later and they seemed to go together well. Enjoy.