Prologue
From the Gates of Hell
I'm dead, surely I'm dead…Skylar Shepard thought as she gasped for air. Her navy blue capacitor chest plate squeezed her front torso, and her weapon pack felt like it weighed five metric-tons. She couldn't see a damned thing except a crack of dim light ahead of her.
Wait…
She could see, she could breathe…and she hurt like hell…surely she was alive.
Shepard moved her arms, surprised that she could do so. She placed her hands on either side of her body and began push up with super-human strength. As every muscle in her upper body screamed in agony, she gritted her teeth and pushed against the metal platform. Even full-armor push-ups during N7 training hadn't been this difficult. Shepard concluded that something must have fallen on top of her in all the chaos. Her voice growled deep within her throat as she strained against the force of artificial gravity to bring herself to her knees. Bringing her left knee up to stabilize her left arm, she began to lift the heavy slab of metal that had been lying across her back. She brought up her other arm to take some of the strain off her neck, and slowly began to rise, using her powerful leg muscles to give her the extra boost she needed to shrug the slab off.
It crashed to the platform, sending small shockwaves through her boots. To her horror, she looked around and saw her squad mates were trapped under similar debris. They lay motionless on the platform, and she feared the worst as she ran over to the crumpled figure on her right. A flash of green scales and the muzzle of an M-97 Viper were distinguishable amidst the rubble: it was Thane.
Shepard grabbed his shoulder and gently turned him over. His large, black eyes blinked both sets of eyelids groggily at her as his eyes attempted to focus. He sat up and Shepard grasped his arm to help him up to his feet. She gave him a firm pat on the shoulder and they exchanged nods, wordlessly acknowledging that Thane was alright.
Turning around, Shepard saw Samara lying under a smaller chunk of metal. She ran over to her and curled her fingers around the slab, throwing it aside. To her relief, Samara's silvery blue eyes looked alertly back at her, letting Shepard know she was conscious. As Shepard helped the Justicar up, her headset crackled as a transmission came through.
"Do you copy? Commander?"
On Normandy's bridge, Joker was sweating bigger bullets than those of Shepard's trusty M-97. Damn that woman, he'd been hailing her for the past five minutes with no response, and it was starting to worry him.
Skylar, please don't do this to me. I can't lose you again. "Come on, Shepard, don't leave me hanging! Do you copy?" He said, desperation leaking into his voice.
Finally, the comms crackled, "I'm here, Joker." Joker leaned back into his chair and rubbed his eyes in relief, "Did the ground team make it?"
Miranda approached the pilot's chair. Joker looked back at her and they exchanged acknowledging nods. He sighed in relief again as he said, "All survivors are on board, we're just waiting for you."
Before he could breathe easy again, he heard the subtle and eerie sound of Collector swarms through the comm channel, followed by gunfire. Shepard neglected to turn off her comm unit as she started to run, evidenced by her heavy breathing and by Harbinger's deep, dark baritone.
"Human! You've changed nothing!"
"Go, Miranda! Get back to a safety harness!" Joker yelled as he fired up the Normandy's engines, which were already hot per Shepard's orders. With extremely practiced hands, he lifted the frigate off the surface of the Collector station.
"Right!" Miranda shouted, and Joker heard her high-heeled boots hit the deck plates as she ran back towards the CIC.
He continued to hear both Shepard's labored breathing and Harbinger's warnings through the open channel, "Your species has the attention of those infinitely your greater. That which you know as Reapers are your salvation through destruction."
Joker swung Normandy's bow so he could see the entrance to the base. In the cavern-like mouth, he could see Shepard, Thane, and Samara sprinting towards him, a group of Collectors in hot pursuit.
"EDI!" Joker called out, answered by the floating blue holographic orb, "I need you to take the helm so I can give them some cover!"
"That will be extremely dangerous, Jeff." EDI pointed out.
Joker shook his head vigorously, "We've talked about this, EDI! I'm not letting them take her down again."
"Very well, Jeff. Just be careful." The AI relented.
Joker inputted the autopilot protocols and got up out of his chair, grabbing an assault rifle from the bridge weapons locker. One thing was for certain: he sure as hell wasn't going to let Sky get gunned down when he finally had her in sight.
"I have control, Jeff." EDI said, "Good luck." The AI swung the ship to starboard, so that the port airlock faced the sprinting squad.
Joker opened the airlock and stood fearlessly on the edge of the deck, raising the M-8 Avenger up to his shoulder. He gritted his teeth into a scowl and fired, taking out at least one Collector and deterring the others. That's right, Joker thought, Don't you even think about taking her down. Not this time.
As the station began to shudder, debris fell all around the Normandy, but Joker kept his steady footing. Thane and Samara sprinted ahead of Shepard, leaping up onto Normandy's deck. They stood beside Joker, flanking him and watching as Shepard sprinted towards the hatch.
Suddenly, a rain of large debris fell perilously close to the Normandy, knocking out the floating platforms that had bridged the gulf between the base's ledge and the ship. Joker looked down, almost immediately regretting it; it was a long, long way down. He looked back up at the gap between the ledge and where he stood, Shepard sprinting as hard as she could towards the ledge.
Oh shit, she's not gonna make it!
No, she'll make it, she's got to…
Joker's heart pounded louder and harder the closer she got to the ledge. When she got there, she took a huge leap towards the ship. Time seemed to slow as Joker watched her reach out, her momentum carrying her ever closer. Her fate would be decided in the next few seconds.
It was over almost as soon as it began. Shepard caught the bottom edge of the airlock as the Collectors began to fire at them again, hoping to hit her and cause her to lose her grip. Samara grabbed the commander's arm and pulled her up into the ship as Joker laid down more cover fire. Once Shepard was in, Joker slammed the button to close the airlock and started to walk as fast as his weak legs could carry him back towards the bridge. Between the adrenaline making his legs feel like jelly and EDI's sudden acceleration of the ship upwards, he almost lost his balance.
EDI began a final countdown to the destruction of the Collector base, "Detonation in ten, nine, eight…"
Joker tossed the rifle to the side and took a seat back in his chair, "Yeah, I get the gist of it, EDI. Hold on!" He disengaged the autopilot and took the Normandy's helm, pulling her into an Immelmann, rolling up and away from the doomed station. Normandy lurched forward as the shockwave from the first blast shook her hull, knocking Shepard forward into the pilot's seat. She cried out in surprise and gripped the back of the chair to keep from falling to the deck. Joker powered up Normandy's throttles to accelerate them up to maximum sub-light velocity. To his surprise, Shepard's gauntleted fingers dug into his shoulders, as if she were hanging on for dear life.
"Get us out of here, Joker." She said, the calm in her voice betrayed by the tension in her grip.
Joker quirked an eyebrow; he rather liked the fact that he was about to whisk her away from certain death.
Like you should have been able to do two years ago…
"Engaging FTL drive," Joker said, inputting Normandy's mass into the Omega 4 companion relay's computer. The helm controls alerted him that the shockwave from the station's main explosion was right on their six, but Joker just cracked a smile. "Eat my exhaust, bitches."
In a flash of crimson light, Normandy became the first non-Collector ship to jump back through the Omega-4 Relay.
Almost instantaneously, Normandy appeared in the Sahrabarik system, alongside the Omega 4 Relay. As soon as the ship materialized, each crew member on deck visibly relaxed. The tension in Shepard's own shoulders released, and relief trickled through her veins. The after-shocks rippled through her body shortly afterwards, causing her to physically shudder.
"Commander," Joker said as the readings showed up on his console, "We're getting an insane amount of comm traffic." He shook his head in amazement. "Every ship and station in the system must be hailing us!"
"Normandy! We read, you, do you need assistance?"
"Commander Shepard, the freighter Athabasca is standing by to assist."
"Cerberus vessel, this is Omega mining tug 5274,
Samara raised her brows, the gold adornments on them creeping up her forehead, "I'm sure this is unusual, since they have never seen anything but a Collector ship jump out of this Relay."
Shepard nodded in agreement, "Put out a general signal, Joker, squawk lost comms." The order she issued would shut them up for the time being when they discovered they had "lost" communications. At that moment, she realized that she still gripped Joker's shoulders, and almost immediately, she let go. She nervously clasped her hands behind her back and wrung at them, embarrassed that she'd manifested her tension in such a manner.
Miranda's boots clicked along the walkway to the bridge. She stopped short of the entrance, "The Illusive Man would like to speak to you, Shepard."
Shepard nodded grudgingly, "I'm sure he does." She grumbled before starting off towards the briefing room. As she made her way through the CIC, she kicked aside any stray debris in her way, and noted that the holographic display of the Normandy in the center console was flickering. She walked through the lab, nodding to Mordin as she passed through. The poor Salarian was digging through the disarray of lab instruments, trying to sort everything out.
When the door to the briefing room opened, she found that a large beam had fallen in front of it, blocking her way. Instead of merely stepping over it, she lifted it up and propped it against the wall. A few electrical wires and hydraulic lines had fallen in the doorway as well, and she carefully brushed them aside before entering the room. The table disappeared into the floor as the holo-communications grid rose up to replace it. She reluctantly stepped through; she wasn't looking forward to dealing with the Illusive Man's bullshit.
He appeared before her, brow furrowed and glowing eyes narrowed in a mixture of disappointment and disdain. He tapped the ash off the end of his cigarette before addressing her. "Shepard, you're making a habit of costing me more than time and money."
"Too many lives were lost at that base," Shepard waved her hand dismissively in front of her, "I'm not sorry it's gone."
"The first of many lives." the Illusive Man retorted, "The technology from that base could have secured human dominance in the galaxy against the Reapers and beyond."
Shepard fired right back, "Human dominance?" She stepped forward to make it clear she was directly challenging him, "Or just Cerberus?"
The Illusive Man rose from his chair, "Strength for Cerberus is strength for every human. Cerberus is humanity." He walked towards her and pointed accusingly at her projection, "I should have known you'd choke on the hard decisions," waving the hand with the cigarette at her, he finished, "too idealistic from the start."
Shepard took her own step forward and pointed right back at him. "I know what you are and the price of dealing with you." She spat, then took a step back and relaxed her stance. Her more relaxed body language didn't mean resignation, however. It meant that she was confident, and would no longer take any of the Illusive Man's crap. It ended here. "We do things my way from now on." The Illusive Man stood in contemplative but stunned silence, puffing his cigarette, just the way Shepard intended him to. "Harbinger is coming and he won't be alone, I'm going to make sure we're ready when they get here." Her hand waved sharply across her body as she continued, "You can fall in line or step aside, but don't get in my way."
The Illusive Man's eyes were like ice, but at the same time burned with the fire of rage. He took several purposeful steps, stopping right in front of her projection. "You're sure that's what you want? You're taking a hell of a risk, Shepard!"
Shepard advanced so that she was eye to eye with the image of the Illusive Man. "I don't think so," she snarled, "I'm going to stop the Reapers, but I'm not going to sacrifice the soul of our species to do it." With that, she decided she'd said her piece and walked out of the holo-grid, smirking as she did so.
Navigating her way back to the bridge through the wreck, she noticed that Joker had been watching her progress through the CIC. As she walked along the catwalk, Joker said, "Did you give him the what for, Commander?"
"You bet your ass I did," Shepard could hardly contain the smile that threatened to spread across her face.
"Serves him right," Joker grunted as he swiveled around back to his console. "We're going to need to dock somewhere for repairs, any preferences?"
Shepard walked up beside him and crossed her arms across her chest plate. "Set a course for the Citadel, best possible speed."
Joker looked up at her and half-smiled, "Already got it laid in, Commander."
Shepard raised an eyebrow, "You're very good at that, you know."
"What?" Joker asked, feigning ignorance.
Shepard slapped the bill of his cap playfully, not enough to skew it, but enough for him to take notice. "Anticipating my every move, of course."
Joker paused for a moment, something that struck Shepard as very odd. Usually he had a come-back for anything anyone said. Finally, he said, "That's what I'm here for."
Shepard nodded, "Right." If she didn't know any better, she would have sworn that he was holding something back from her. What he just said wasn't a typical response from him; usually it was some kind of remark laced with sarcasm and his famous dry wit. This was something completely different.
"I'd better get out of this armor," she said, wanting to break the awkward silence. As she turned to walk away, Joker spoke again.
"Commander," he said, sounding a little forced. She turned back around at looked at him expectantly. He looked back up at her, right into her eyes, holding her gaze for a few moments. In those moments, Shepard realized something she had never really noticed before: Joker's eyes were a brilliant shade of green.
"I'm glad you made it back," Joker continued his thought, "for a minute there, I thought I - I mean, we - were going to lose you again."
Shepard cocked her head to the side slightly, contemplating what he had just said. "I'm glad I made it back, too, Joker." She replied, not sure of what else she was supposed to say.
Joker nodded curtly and acknowledged her, "Commander," then he turned back around. Shepard waited for a few drawn-out seconds on the ramp, looking at the back of her helmsman's head. Does he…?
She finally walked away and shook her head slightly. Nah.
Commander Skylar Shepard stood just short of the entrance to the main cargo bay. The scene was incredible: all of her crew mates were working to patch as much of the ship together as they could enroute to the Citadel. Nothing could make her more proud than to see a band of people so different come together. Something about surviving that mission did something for them…and it did something for her, too. She trusted each and every one of them with her life, and they trusted her with theirs.
She stepped into the bay and was immediately greeted by Thane, who rendered a salute to her as he walked by. Seeing Legion, Jack, Grunt, and Garrus all working on the same damaged section, she realized just how much they trusted her as they all looked up to acknowledge her as she walked by. Jack gave her a curt and confident nod, more than Shepard could have ever asked from her. Joker was working beside them, and had looked up initially, then back down again. He did a double take when she stopped beside him, standing up to look her right in the eyes. As he walked over to her, he gave her a data pad with a Reaper schematic downloaded onto it. Shepard took it, still trying to decode the look in his eyes…the same look he had given her on the bridge mere hours ago. He didn't say a word as he walked off to attend to other things, leaving her staring out a forcefield that contained one of the many hull breaches in the bay.
Looking out into the vast darkness of space, she knew that somewhere beyond those stars, the Reapers were coming. A cold pit settled into her stomach; would they be able to save the galaxy, standing alone without the Citadel, the Alliance, or even Cerberus to support them? Shepard looked back at her crew…her hardworking, intensely loyal crew, then back out into the void. The cold feeling in her gut melted away.
If anyone in the universe could defeat the Reapers, it was the crew of the Normandy.