Chapter I.
Repercussions.
The Sword Fleet wasn't doing very well.
Admiral Hackett was currently aboard his flagship SSV Orizaba, bent over holographic map of the Sol system, coordinating the allied fleets of all races, trying to concentrate their fire on single targets, namely Destroyers and Capital Ships of the Reapers. His efforts was successful to a certain degree - Sword Fleet already destroyed about a dozen Destroyers and even managed to cripple a few Capital Ships.
But those minor victories came with a great cost. While it took a massive firepower of a large number of ships to overcome Reaper's vessel defenses and to do enough damage to tear apart it's hull, it took only one, in the best case a few strikes of Reaper's red beam to completely destroy any ship in the Sword Fleet, except maybe the Destiny Ascension, but even asari were taking heavy casualties.
Even worse, Reapers' losses were too small compared to overall number of their forces in the Sol system to have any positive impact on the battle. And already reports were coming, indicating that new enemy ships are entering the system, seemingly from nowhere, not even using the Charon Relay.
Apparently Reapers decided to accelerate the destruction of the resistance.
It's a good thing we never planned to win this battle on our own, then.
The whole fight, both in space and on the Earth's surface was merely a distraction, an attempt to give Commander Shepard enough time to reach the Citadel and activate the Crucible, which was supposed to destroy all Reapers or at least make them vulnerable enough to be defeated via conventional means. Unfortunately, it was also the part, where something went very wrong.
Commander John Shepard was last seen on the ground, participating in charge towards the beacon, which was the only way to the captured Citadel, when his forces came under attack from a few Capital Ships of the Reapers, including Harbinger. As a result of the attack everyone around Shepard was considered dead or went missing, with the exception of former turian C-Sec officer Garrus Vakarian and asari scientist Liara T'soni. Both of them were picked up by the shuttle, piloted by Lieutenant Steve Cortez, and safely returned to Normandy, although they failed to inform Hackett of Shepard's possible whereabouts. However, both of Shepard's friends expressed a strong belief that Commander is indeed still alive and has successfully reached the Citadel. Naturally, they had no real proof to back up their claim.
Roughly forty minutes later Hackett got all the proof he needed, when Admiral heard Shepard's voice on the comm. Commander sounded tired, unsure and exhausted. Shepard must have suffered severe injuries and his last words weren't very reassuring either. He opened the Citadel's arms, but Hackett still needed Commander to activate the damned Crucible, despite the fact that neither of them had any idea how to do it.
Another thirty minutes passed. Hackett tried to raise Shepard on comm for a dozen times, but received no answer. A terrible picture sprang in his head – Shepard, lying in a pool of his own blood only a few steps away from the button, that must put an end to the nightmare called Reapers.
No! He wouldn't do this to us. Shepard didn't surrender on Akuze, and he sure as hell wouldn't abandon us now. Come on, Commander! Don't you dare to die without getting the job done!
The worst thing was, Admiral couldn't even send anyone to help Shepard or replace him. Harbinger and his lackeys continued to guard the beam on the ground, while the whole swarm of Oculuses was patrolling the space near the Citadel, supported by a few Destroyers and a Capital Ship. All vessels which tried to enter the structure ended up destroyed. Meanwhile Normandy was trying to get inside since Vakarian and T'Soni were taken aboard, but succeed only in staying in one piece. Hackett already tried a few times to order Flight Lieutenant Jeff Moreau to leave the Citadel alone and join the fight, to which Joker irritably advised Admiral to stop pretending that this fight was more important then Shepard's mission inside the Citadel. Hackett was not very happy with Moreau's ignoring his direct orders, but Admiral was too busy coordinating the rest of the Sword Fleet to insist. Besides, Lieutenant Moreau hold the fame of the best pilot in the Alliance, so perhaps he indeed had the biggest chance of getting inside the Citadel.
Which still doesn't change the fact that no one knows, how to activate the Crucible.
Suddenly Hackett's unhappy thoughts were disrupted by the voice of Hannah Saint, captain of the SSV Orizaba:
"Admiral, look!"
Hackett traced her gesture to one of the control screens nearby, which was monitoring the Citadel, and froze, when he saw a large sphere of light blue energy, emerging from the opened Citadel. The ball continued to rapidly grow in size, as if it wanted to contain the entire Sol system inside itself.
And before Hackett had time to order his ships to stay the hell way from this blue energy just in case, Admiral saw it went through the ones closest to the Citadel without doing them any visible harm. Second later various captains reported that their ships didn't register any damage, and the crew felt nothing either.
Thank God Crucible doesn't seem to affect non-Reaper forces. But what about the Reapers themselves?
Hackett got the answer soon enough, since there were a lot of Reapers' ships in close proximity of the Citadel. The blue energy went through them without any visible effect… save for the fact, that their insides now were shining with light blue instead of bright red.
I have no idea what this supposed to mean, but it can be our only chance for victory.
"To all ships of the Sword Fleet", - commanded Hackett,- "concentrate your fire on Reapers, affected by this energy, whatever it is."
They did as was told, but nothing really happened. Reapers' ships took a certain amount of damage, but it was no different than in their usual state. Whatever the Crucible did to enemy vessels, it clearly didn't affect their defenses.
Before Admiral could think about anything else, another report came:
"Admiral", - said Captain Saint, - "our sensors have just detected a large exhaust of eezo in the location of the Charon Rela…" And then she suddenly shouted: " Admiral!"
Hackett once again turned to the control monitors, one of which was now showing the Charon Relay, just in time to see it exploding when the part of now enormous light blue sphere reached it.
Oh. My. God.
Hackett felt his heart stopped beating… or so he thought. What did it matter anyway? Now, when he and his whole fleet were stranded here, unable to retreat or to get reinforcements (which didn't exist in any case), when the homeland of the humanity was cut off from the galactic community and was at mercy of Reapers… and they will have none.
It's like we were locked up in the cage with a hungry lion and the key was immediately thrown away. Damn you, Shepard, what have you done?
But before Hackett could issue any further orders (not that he had any in particular except "everyone, fight to the death"), he heard the voice of Captain Saint again:
"Admiral, we are receiving multiple reports, that all indicate the same thing",- said she, -"Sir, Reapers have stopped fighting our forces. Their ships are seen leaving the Earth".
"What?" – snapped Hackett, losing his calm tone for the first time since the battle of Earth started,- "Captain, repeat!"
"I repeat, all Reapers' vessels have stopped firing at us and are moving towards the location… former location of the Charon Relay", - obediently answered Hannah Saint, - "Our troops report that enemy ground forces have either collapsed or exploded or simply stopped performing any action whatsoever… Admiral, what's going on?"
Hackett looked at her, but didn't answer. Not aloud, anyway.
I wish I knew, god dammit.
"All allied forces of the Sword Fleet", -he said at last, - "Do not pursue the Reapers, I repeat, leave them alone. Gather all ships around the Citadel and assume defense position. All ground troops, take out all husks in your immediate vicinity and wait for further orders. SSV Normandy prepare to…"
Admiral stopped, when he realized that Normandy has disappeared from all control screens and the Orizaba's scanners can't find it anywhere. Granted, it was a stealth ship after all…
"SSV Normandy, this is Admiral Hackett, do you copy, over? Lieutenant Moreau, do you hear me, over?"
No answer came. Soon other ships confirmed that they couldn't detect Normandy and never had any contact with the ship.
Normandy was near the Citadel when the Crucible fired. Now it vanished, just like the Reapers' fleet disappeared somewhere behind Pluto. And the sphere of blue energy was gone too, but not before it engulfed the Earth.
But Crucible did nothing to the planet or to our ships.
Hackett sighed. The fact that Crucible didn't perform as expected was bad enough, now they lost both Commander Shepard and his ship. And the the Charon Relay was gone, meaning that no one of their allies will be able to return home anytime soon, and the Earth has to recover on its own.
If it will have any time to recover at all. Where did all the Reapers go anyway and for how long?
The possibility that the Charon Relay wasn't the only one that got destroyed haven't crossed Admiral's mind yet. But the current situation looked pretty grim to him and right now Hackett had no idea how new inhabitants of the Sol system are going to live through it.
Author note: Just like a lot of other people I didn't really like ME 3 endings. But instead of trying to replace them, I decided to roll with the one, I thought the best and bring it to a closure (maybe even a happy one). It is the Control Ending, as you see.
Sith Lord Darth Revan - It will not be focused on Liara and Shepard relationship. Liara will have an appearance, assuming I ever get that far, but I am far more worried about the fate of the galaxy and Shepard's role in it, than the romance. Sorry, shippers. I like Liara though.
calilove, DestinyDragon01 - Actually it was supposed to be a story, not a one/twoparter. I am just afraid I am not good enough as a writer to finish it properly. I see how things will unfold in my head, vaguely, but it make sense to me. But I fear my writing skills and my imagination could be not enough to make it clear and understandable for everyone else. I don't want to write bad, I better won't write at all.