Here's your ticket pack your bags
Time for jumpin' overboard
Transportation isn't here
Close enough but not too far,
Maybe you know where you are
Fightin' fire with fire, huah
(Burning Down The House, Talking Heads)
September 10, 2183
Lieutenant Commander Izaias T. Shepard, Commander of the SSV Normandy, pride of the Alliance, was working on a half-melted console, doing his best to control what was left of the fire suppression systems in his ursa medium assault armor.
Five minutes ago, an unidentified vessel had been detected by Talitha Draven, assumed to be a slaver ship by Navigator Charles Pressley, and flagged, oddly without sarcasm, as a UFO by Jeff 'Joker' Moreau. The vessel evidently boasted sensor technology advanced enough to void the Normady's highly classified, highly advanced stealth systems, and opened fire with an energy beam weapon shortly after assuming an interception course at the Normandy. The beam shredded, or, more accurately, melted through the Normandy's plating, and caused untold electrical and structural damage. Many components overloaded. The byproducts of these system malfunctions ran the gambit from electrocution, to burns of varying degree and dismemberment.
Back to the present.
Izaias had, feverishly working the controls, rerouted coolant, stopped eight individual electrical fires, and remotely reset 61 fuses. In the middle of dealing with a leaking electrical subsystem component, he heard Kaidan's voice, slightly synthesized through an Alliance-issue helmet, ask "Commander, you think the Alliance will get here in time?".
The response, formulated while grabbing two fire extinguishers from a nearby wall housing, came quickly.
"Based on their track record, no."
Shepard tossed Kaidan one of the extinguishers.
"Kaidan, make sure everyone is off this deck, then take an escape pod. I'm checking the lower deck, then blowing the joint"
"Joker's still upstairs, Shepard…" Kaidan added the latter in an undertone. "…though I can't fathom why."
Izaias nodded briefly.
"K, then. I'll tend to deck 1 after I clear the lower deck.
Kaidan's reply, "I'm not leaving you", was met with a stoic, "You are".
Kaidan resigned to his fate, and Shepard sped off to the freight elevator, interrupted momentarily by a tremor. They came and went. He doused a fire in his way, and tossed the extinguisher.
Tali Zorah Nar Rayya, resident engineering savant, was taking the elevator up with the wide-eyed engineering crew, the 'Quartermaster', and Garrus Vakarian, present-day bad-boy, former Citadel security officer and idealist. Izaias nodded at Garrus. The greeting was reciprocated.
"Tali, is that everyone from the lower deck?"
"Yes, everyone's here."
"Great…." The SPECTRE redirected his attention. "…Everyone, follow either Garrus Vakarian or Kaidan Alenko to the port or starboard escape pods. Get to it."
Tali looked at him fearfully, though it was hard to tell. The nearly opaque visor coupled with her foreign upbringing made inferences difficult and prone to inaccuracies. He managed. The benefit having someone he could rely on, especially her, coupled with the unpleasantness of making her unhappy spurred a revisal of his original plan.
She half-turned to go before he managed "Tali, you want to help me clear the CIC?".
I could swear she jumped a little.
"I can do that"
"K..." He paused, mentally editing out 'my dear'. "... Lets get Joker out of that chair." I've been doing that a lot recently. Are these mental gymnastics what friendzone me? He dismissed the wayward thoughts, shooing them away like ever so many ravens.
A steady drumbeat of shudders jarred what had been the Normandy. Escape pods. Good. I don't want any additional casualties. Caution is ever advisable.
"EVERYONE LOADED? DECK 1 IS A VACUUM."
A gravelly Turian voice droned over intercom. "Shepard, we have these things for a reason. I could hear you through Tali's comm channel. Yes, all loaded. I'm floating in space right now in fact, watching the Normandy turn to slag. Oh, and it looks like our friends are backing off."
Shepard triggered the door release after 'loaded'.
"Thanks, Vakarian. That's good news. Have a couple pods try STG, Quarian, or Turian distress frequencies. That might be a safer bet than praying for the Alliance. Also, get the pods as far away from that friggin' cruiser as possible."
"Got it, Shepard."
Tali and Shepard, clanking across the CIC, had made it past the planetary map by now. The former interface flickered uneasily, unwittingly providing an accurate visual representation of hope in a dire situation. The purple bubble of the emergency cabin shield could be made out in the distance.
"Tali, your mag feet things handling this?"
"We still call them 'boots' Shepard."
"Oh, sorry."
"It's fine, Shepard."
"No offense meant, but you mind using my first name? I'd like to think we're on first-name basis."
They had reached the final hallway. Chairs and bodies floated about. The roof was gone. Space loomed above.
"I can do that Sh...Izaias."
He smiled, pushing a disconcertingly weightless chair out of their way. "Shizaias sounds like my rapper name."
"You Bosh'tet."
He smiled, knowing she was as well. It was an acquired skill. One that took me far too long to acquire.
"Let's get everyone's favorite pilot."
...A Bald Corpse was slumped over a chair. He never left his post. God bless the man. Pressley's dead. Hell. Dwelling on it wouldn't help. He hoped Tali wouldn't notice. He hated it when she was sad.
There was pressure on his shoulder joint. He glanced over. It was her hand.
"Shepard, what's going on?"
He mustered as much cheer as he could. It didn't work.
"Nothing, lets' get Joker"
"Fine. But you're telling me in the pod."
He could handle that. The pair breached the bubble.
Joker managed a bitter "Glad you could make it".
Tali responded before Izaias' brain caught up.
"Jeff, we're in a wreck in a decaying orbit above a dead planet. Please, get in the pod."
A petulant "Yes, mom." left his lips. Izaias recovered.
"Tali, you mind helping Jeff? I should fetch the black box."
He knelt down by Pressley, grabbed the man's dog tags, pulling the access hatch, and grabbed the friendly yellow black box. Wrapping Pressley's tags around the handle, Izaias turned to face Tali and Jeff, two important entries in his very short list of favorite people.
The vessel was gone. Escape was probable. This day might actually end well.
He managed a stride in their direction. Tali's eyes changed.
"Shepard, run! They're coming back!"
Yelling "CATCH!", he began to sprint, in mag boots no less, the eight feet between him and the pod. Tali caught the box.
The vessel's beam weapon began firing again, its sickly yellow reflected in her visor. He also saw, before him, Jeff bravely, haplessly attempting to restrain a distraught Tali with one arm as she yelled, loudly, what he thought was "Shepard". Either the helmet speakers or comm suite were suffering terrible interference, almost assuredly from the beam's energy emissions.
Jeff's other arm remained out of view, presumably ready to trigger 'launch' button of the pod.
Sometimes, feeling things sucks. Izaias had two of those moments. Tali's eyes at that moment conveyed a mix of fear, longing, despair, hopelessness, and general discomfort. A metal part, propelled from the wreckage of the forward CIC by the explosion of an oxygen tank, conveyed kinetic energy. It felt like someone hit him with a very thick book in the back of the head; slightly soft, but ultimately hard and unforgiving. 'I hope we make it' was his last thought before he blacked out.
