An End, Once and For All
The war was at fever pitch. The atmosphere of Earth was surrounded by fire and war and death machines, decimating Hackett's fleet. The ground situation wasn't much better. Harbinger itself had assaulted Shepard's team in their final assault, and Shepard was a lot worse for wear. His gear was completely destroyed. His right arm was exposed, the armour had been burned off of his arm and he was now sporting a crimson blood sleeve on his arm. The breastplate of his N7 armour had been burned on to his chest and there were layers of drying blood covering the Commander's head. The Catalyst had been found, the Crucible just needed to be activated and that unenviable duty had placed on the shoulders of John Shepard.
But he couldn't do it.
Shepard had faced down Reapers and Thresher Maws and had always come out on top, but right now the Commander was on his knees about to destroy all synthetic life in the galaxy, but he just couldn't. He couldn't raise his arms or stay on his feet for much longer. The fire in his heart that had been so fiercely ignited only several hours ago had been surely extinguished when he had witnessed two dead bodies after Harbinger's assault. The first dead body belonged to Garrus Vakarian, a turian soldier who had served with the Commander since the days of Saren, the rogue Spectre, but more importantly he had been Shepard's greatest and most trusted friend.
The other body had belonged to Lieutenant Commander Ashley Williams, Shepard's right hand woman and maybe if this war had never happened, she would have been his wife and the mother of his children, but the war had taken her from him. She knew this was dangerous, but she was always so stubborn and when Shepard had told her that he wanted her to stay with Joker in the Normandy, she had told him that they had started all of this together and would end it together, and if they were gonna go down, they'd do it side by side. Now Shepard was at the peak of the galaxy, holding the power over generations of civilization…without her.
He wondered what Anderson would do if he was here. He had made Shepard the same promise that Ashley had, that they would end this war together. Shepard fought the mind control of the Illusive Man to save Anderson, just for him to die from his wounds.
All of this had made him weak. The loss of a brother, the loss of his greatest love and the loss of the man he thought of as his father had crushed him. He looked ahead at one of the Crucible's tanks. Inside that tank contained the energy to influence what happened in the galaxy for the rest of eternity. The longer Shepard stayed here and waited, the more people die. He had to move, but he couldn't.
"Shepard," a powerful voice said.
He was no longer looking at the Crucible's tank in front of him, instead stood Garrus Vakarian, standing tall and proud.
"Do you remember what we've been fighting for all these years?"
"Yes," Shepard croaked, nodding his head.
Suddenly he was being raised to his feet. Lifting him from his knees was his fallen squad mate, Kaidan Alenko, smiling. Shepard returned the smile.
"Do you remember what we came here to do?" Garrus asked.
"Of course," Shepard nodded.
Suddenly, they were all arrayed in front of him. On the right of Garrus was Admiral Anderson, standing uninjured and spectacular in his military uniform. To the left of the turian was Joker, hunched over and saluting. All of Shepard's squad saluted.
"Remember us, Shepard," Garrus said, "we got you here, now all you have to do is finish the job," Garrus and the entire squad disappeared.
For a moment Shepard was alone, and then his gun arm was being raised. He looked to his right. Standing steadying his arm was Ashley, smiling her flawless smile at him.
"What did I tell you?" She whispered to him, "you're not finishing this without me."
"Ash," Shepard began.
"Don't," Ashley demanded, maintaining her smile, "I'm here now. No looking back, Shepard. No matter what you do, the galaxy is going to change. I love you, and I'm right beside you."
With Ashley holding his arm, Shepard opened fire on the tank with his pistol, cracking the glass. The squad reappeared behind him. Knowing that Ashley was there, that they were all with him, he was becoming gradually stronger. As Shepard smashed the glass on the tank, Ashley pressed her face against his cheek and simply uttered;
"See you soon. I love you."
The explosion was like nothing Shepard had ever witnessed. He was knocked off of his feet by the overwhelming force before the flames engulfed him. He could feel the flames licking away at his skin and his hair and burning through his armour, but he felt no pain. They were waiting for him, wherever they were. Ashley was waiting on him.