In the heat of battle. Memories flood back into his head. Memories he's shared with the people around him. Memories he has shared with the people expecting him to come back. Expecting him to return to their ship. Alive.
"Commander, you've received a new message at your private terminal."
This was usually the way Kelly greeted him as he approached. Either that or she'd simply say.
"No new messages Commander."
Ever since Shepard had chosen to pursue a relationship with Tali she'd started acting rather cold toward him. He had even returned from a mission to his captains quarters one day to find his fish floating at the top of their aquarium.
This time, he'd received a message about a planet not too far away. Joker had picked up a distress signal, and had sent the decoded message to his terminal. Up until now, he'd only known that the message didn't detail an awful lot, now he could take a look himself.
Mayday, mayday. This is Dr. Valyn Atgur, we need urgent assistance at our base station o-*Data lost*-ambushed our facility. We need urgent assistance. I don't know how many have survived, but we can't afford to lose our research.*Shots fired*. *Screams in background*. *More shots fired*. *More screams*. *Untranslated*. *Data lost*. –ut us just *data lost* the research.*End message*. *Repeat*.
Joker determined that the message had been repeated one thousand, two hundred and thirty seven times, during two minute intervals. So there may still be some survivors. If not, they may still be able to recover some of the research data. Joker was able to locate the source of the signal, and retrieve the co-ordinates.
Shepard gathered his squad together. Tali had insisted Shepard take her with him on the mission, and therefore would be lending her biotic powers to the team, while Garrus would accompany him for fire support, and would balance out the squad.