Thursday afternoon

"Go, Shepard! I will hold the line!"

I don't bother arguing with EDI, and dive through the closing door as the drone cuts through three troopers at once, electrifying their hardsuits and sending them tumbling to the floor.

A nav-point appears on my HUD, but judging by this room, it'll be quite a maze: an office, with a waist-height wall leading out into a corridor.

I can hear something buzzing. Something loud, something low-pitched, throbbing and bassy in nature.

There's something tingling on my head—it's my mole, itching and burning, but I can't scratch it through my helmet. It's nice to know that I've retained it, at least, between genders.

There's a crack and a flash of red triangles ahead of me, and I snap off two rifle shots. The pulse rifle has a lot of recoil, but it's effective: the two Cerberus troopers crumple in a shower of electrical arcs and sparking.

"EDI," I call, "can you get me a schematic, or a map?"

"Negative, Commander. The corridor you have entered appears not to be on any internal schematics."

So whatever it is, it must be important. The buzzing noise gets louder as I proceed, keeping a close eye on the IFF sensor at the side-corridors and doors.

There's a glowing red panel next to this bulkhead. LEVEL 1 SECURITY CLEARANCE ONLY. DO NOT ALLOW OTHERS TO TAILGATE BEHIND YOU—YOU ARE ON VIDEO!

Whatever's happening in here, Cerberus wants it quiet, so that's probably a good way to go: the terminals suggested that the Prothean VI from Thessia might have been stored in here.

I press my omni-tool against the door, and the dials spin and turn. The bulkhead unseals and splits, and—

"Shit!" I gasp, stepping back and firing a rifle blast into the temple of the husk that's crept through the door. There's more—dozens behind it, their glowing faces scowling at me as they reach for me, pull at the release clasp on my helmet—

BOOM.

The world spins, my brain splits open in pain as a grenade blast hurls me back at least ten metres. The husks scream as they burn, their bodies disintegrating into piles of ash, and—

"Shepard," I hear.

That's my voice: the voice I had when I was a man, and I blink, and look upwards.

"You're in my hardsuit." That's me—it's disconcerting, seeing myself and it not moving, like a reflection, whenever I do. "Come on. On your feet, soldier," he says.

Is this another Shepard? He—

"You're me," I say, leaning backwards and pushing myself upright.

"And you're me," he says. "And no offence, but I'd quite like my own ass back."

He—the person in my body—is a she. "This is your body?"

"Yeah. This yours?"

"One of three," I say. "I guess you've noticed what's going on, then?"

"Very quickly," the other Shepard says, waving me forwards. "As soon as I grew a penis."

She's nothing if not forthright. "Do you know how many of us there are?"

"Four, at least." She (it is a she, despite her male appearance) marches forward, as if she hadn't just dispatched around a dozen husks with a single incendiary grenade. "I've been in four bodies so far."

"Including your own?"

"Yup. Same?"

"Same," I say. "Any idea what's causing it?"

"What do you think?" the other Shepard says, incredulously. "It's gotta be Cerberus."

"I thought so."

"But this is crazy, even for a sonofabitch like the Illusive Man," she mused.

"That, and Sanctuary," I agree. "Whatever he's doing… I want a word with him."

"Yep." The other Shepard peers around a bend in the corridor, and waves us forward. "And then put a bullet between his eyes."

"That, too." My head's still sore from the grenade blast. "I'll bet he's left here by now, though. Probably—gah!"

I feel a searing pain at the base of my neck, and the other Shepard grunts, and we both tumble to the ground.


The floor is black, reflective tiling, and it takes me a few seconds to work out which way is up.

I reach upwards and touch my head. No hair—I'm buzz cut, and I can feel all my own parts between my legs. It's nice to have the correct sexual features again.

"Up! Look up!"

I roll onto my back at the sound of my own voice as the face of the woman Shepard—the face I'd had until just now—swims into view.

"You OK?"

"Fine. What the hell just happened?"

"Ask yourself," she says, gesturing with her head at a glowing control terminal with two soldiers stood at it.

I stand, and they turn their heads. Two more of me. Great. I rub my forehead with my fingers—it's hard to feel through the haptic simulators of the gloves, but it's my scar again. "I'm assuming it's you that did that?" I demand.

"Yes," the Shepard on the right says. "We should now all be in the correct bodies."

"How does it work?"

"It's a chip of some kind, that's all we know. And we know where it is."

"Where?"

"Think about it," the woman Shepard says, rubbing the back of her neck.

Gently, I raise my hand to my neck and find that mole. Suddenly it doesn't feel like a mole: too soft, too detached, and with a core too solid.

Gently, wincing, I pull at it, and it comes free. Now that I can see it properly, it's glowing slightly, a pale blue. "That's it, then?"

"Looks like it." The woman Shepard removes her mole, drops it on the floor, and crushes it beneath her boot. "I knew I couldn't trust that bastard," she says.

"It still doesn't explain why." I peer around the room properly for the first time. There's a tremendous glass wall at one end, tinted hard-glass pock-marked with strikes from stellar wind and micrometeorites. The star outside is enormous, orange-red, its tumultuous surface wobbling angrily.

"This is the Illusive Man's office," I whisper. I've only ever seen it as a hologram before, and I'm surprised by how cold, how cavernous it is. One of the other male Shepards is sat in the chair where the Illusive Man always seemed to sit, smoking something or other.

There's a strong smell of tobacco, and some residual smoke hovering near the ceiling.

"What's your progress?" I ask.

"Vendetta is on here," the Shepard sat in the Illusive Man's seat says. "It'll take a while to start up, thou—"

He freezes mid-sentence as the vid-comm platform behind me activates, and flashes bright blue.

"Shepard."

It's the Illusive Man.

"Shepards," he corrects himself, "you're in my office."

"It's not your office any more," the Shepard sat in the seat says, rising and pushing past me to glare at the hologram. "What's been happening to us, what you've been doing… this is wrong. You're not God."

"Still so naïve," the hologram says, taking a drag on a cigarette, "I suppose that is a multiversal constant."

"You can't hide behind your bullshit forever," the woman Shepard snaps. "This isn't for humanity's sake. You've hurt me, you've hurt my friends. This stops. Now."

"Why?" I venture, leaning forward towards the hologram, hands hovering around the pistol at my waist.

"It's an advantage of building your base in the gravity well of an unstable star. It acts as something of an… antechamber. This complex in particular is configured such that it's a multiversal fixed point."

"Doesn't answer my question," the other male me says. "Why? What are you doing?"

"I understand Miranda told you about her suggestion of a mind-control chip," the Illusive Man begins. "She did make me think very hard, and eventually, I did compromise… albeit without her knowledge."

"And how does playing with time control my mind?"

"Not control. Guide." He takes another drag, and exhales deeply. "By exchanging you with a more… sympathetic version of yourself, I could retain your personality, and be guaranteed your loyalty."

"This is wrong," I say. "You've no right to declare yourself master of the universe."

"Is that what you'd do? Leave our race to fester? Understand me, Shepard," the hologram growls, leaning forward, pointing with his cigarette. "Taking control is the key to advancing our race. If we don't seize the opportunity to take control, we stagnate and we die."

"If I get my way," the woman Shepard says, stepping between me and the Illusive Man, "you'll have a bullet up your ass before you get the chance."

"I'll look forward to it," the hologram smirks. "Your idealism is admirable, but… foolish. Destroying the Reapers would be the greatest folly in human history."

"They're occupying Earth!" she ejaculates, shivering with rage. "You'd rather let them harvest our races? Those are people. Real people."

"Your myopia never ceases to amaze me." The Illusive Man turns, and begins to disintegrate. "Enjoy your little chat, but I've already acquired what you're looking for. Don't outstay your welcome."

"At arms!" she calls, suddenly, and there's a crack as a shadowy figure emerges from the threshold behind the glowing holographic particles.

Kai Leng.

I grasp my pistol and fire, once, twice, and his shields flare bright blue. Another Shepard (I've stopped keeping track of which one's which) empties his heatsink into Leng's shield generator as he charges towards us with a machete.

I fire on the sword. It shatters into two shards and Leng swings his fragment over his shoulder. The female Shepard kicks him between the legs. She clasps at his wrist and grapples, twisting the machete from his hands.

He headbutts her away. He leaps at another of us and I fumble to reload my assault rifle.

"Get him, quick!" one of us yells, "he's lost shields!"

The heatsink clicks into place, and I take aim, and squeeze thirty rounds into Leng's back.

The woman Shepard punches him on the nose, and again, and throws him to the floor with a thump as she activates her omni-blade and drives it through Leng's chest.

There's a crackle as Leng's shield generator fails, and silence.

"Everyone in one piece?" one of the others asks, to a chorus of "yes"es.

I take a deep breath and turn about to the terminal, as another Shepard rushes to complete the startup process for the Prothean VI dump.

"Online. Quantum fluctuations detected," it says, the green hologram flickering where the Illusive Man had been standing a moment before. "Security protocols permit me to answer your queries."

"We need to know what the Catalyst is," another Shepard says.

"I will comply," the VI announces. "The Catalyst is a structure which amplifies the transmission of dark energy signatures through four-space via the mass relay network. It was originally a Reaper construction, intended to be harnessed by the Crucible to help eliminate their threat."

"How?"

"The Crucible is not a weapon. It is a bio-molecular synthesiser. Its primary function is to transform both synthetic and organic biologies around a new template."

"And how does that defeat the Reapers?" the woman Shepard demands.

"Unknown. This construct is not equipped to simulate the outcome of the activation of the Crucible."

So we're activating a weapon—a weapon that isn't a weapon—and we have no idea what it's actually supposed to do. Great.

The VI continues, "the Catalyst is incorporated into the Crucible design to amplify the transmission of the synthesis signal. Once an invading matrix is loaded into the system, the mass relay network is overloaded to ensure a perpetual broadcast of the transmission signal across the galaxy."

"So we use their own technology against them," the woman Shepard says.

"That is correct."

"Yes," I press, "but what is the Catalyst?"

"The races in your cycle refer to it as the Citadel."

The Citadel? Dammit. "Thank you," I say, turning to the other Shepards. "We need to get the Crucible to the Citadel."

"That may no longer be possible," the VI interrupts. "The data stored on this system indicates that the Reapers have been informed of the completion of the Crucible by the one you refer to as the Illusive Man. The Catalyst has been moved."

"Moved!" another Shepard says.

"Yes. It has been captured by the Reapers and moved to the Sol system."

"Sol… Earth." I turn back to the other Shepards. "Why Earth? What's special about Earth?"

"If it's the current focus of the harvesting efforts, it'll be easy to fortify it there."

"In that case," I say, "we have to get back to the Sol system. Now."

"You," the woman Shepard corrects me.

"What?"

"Once we leave this complex, we'll all be trapped in our own timelines. Remember?"

Our own timelines. For a moment I'd forgotten that I was talking with alternate versions of myself. "Yes. At least we know, now."

"We're wasting our time here," she says, turning and striding away. I want to stop her, but I'm not sure why.

"We've got to go, now," another says, and marches to the door as the other returns to the Illusive Man's terminal and activates his omni-tool.

"What are you doing?"

"Copying a dump of the VI," he says, re-seating himself in the Illusive Man's chair. "It'll only take a minute or two."

I remember the alternate Shepards whose bodies I occupied. Which one's this one?

"Shepard," I say, only now realising how odd it is to address someone else with my own name, "are you… in your world, do you have something going on with Kaidan?" It's a fifty-fifty chance, but he needs to know the news.

The other man looks up. "Yes, I do. Why?"

"When I was… uh," I say, uncertain of how to phrase this. "When I was in your world, in your body, Kaidan told me some news… bad news."

His face hardens a little. "Bad news?"

"Yeah, he's… Chakwas scanned him to see if she could find out what was making the migraines worse." I take a deep breath. "He's got a brain tumour."

He inhales sharply, but says nothing as I continue. "He said the prognosis is about a year's life expectancy… and they can operate, but it'd mean removing his implant. And the mortality rate's…"

"Very high?"

"Forty per cent," I say.

The other Shepard's mouth clenches shut, and he looks away, at the terminal. "I'm sorry," I blurt. "I'm sorry you had to hear it from me."

"It's not a problem," he says, completing the download and running an integrity check. "At least I heard it from myself."

"Huh," I chuckle. I pause for a moment. "If you don't mind me asking," I venture, quietly, "what happened on Virmire in your world?"

"It was…" he says, pausing to find the right words just like I would—he and I are the same man, the two most similar, at least, I remember. "I still remember exactly what happened. Kaidan pinged me as soon as I stepped out of that elevator… and the mission computer said I was eight metres closer to him than I was to Ash."

Eight metres. "That's funny," I said. "The way I remember it, I ran from the elevator, and… the HUD said I was six metres closer to Ash. If it hadn't been…"

Fourteen metres. If I hadn't run from the elevator… it's frightening, unsettling and depressing that that was all that was in it. Fourteen metres, less than five second's sprinting.

"Yeah." We both know what the other is thinking, imagining how different things could have been. "Is there anything happening between you and Ash?"

"Yeah." Ash. I suddenly felt an itch to get out of here, get back to the ship and hold Ash tight. "We've been going for… around three years now."

"Good," the other Shepard says, sending a copy of the VI dump to my omni-tool.

"What about you?"

"Six weeks," he says. "He wasn't too sure himself. He needed Joker to push him into doing something."

I smile. "Sounds like the Kaidan I knew."

"He said he'd wanted me for months, years, even." The other Shepard sighs. "If I'd known… well, maybe things would've been different."

"Yeah." We pass through the threshold and back through the complex corridor, fingers trained on the triggers of our (identical) assault rifles. "We can't dwell on it, though."

We're back at the bulkhead, now, and the doors are sealed. There's no sign of the other two Shepards. "Well," the other me says, "I suppose… this is goodbye."

"I suppose so." I hold out my hand, and the other Shepard takes it, shaking with a grip that feels oddly limp. "Reckon anyone else has shaken hands with themselves in the past?"

"Probably not." He smiles and pats my shoulder. "Have a good life, Shepard. And… do Ashley proud."

"You too, you do the same. Be fearless, and… make damn sure Kaidan gets the chance to have that surgery."

"Yeah." He cocks a grin, as I pop an identical one. "Good luck," he smiles, and the bulkhead slides open as he vanishes in a hail of Cerberus bullets.

"Shepard!" That's EDI's voice, and she sends another centurion toppling as I run free, free of the antechamber, back home.


Thursday evening

The doors are finally silent again, but they're taking forever to open and close.

The lights are on the emergency settings, and there's still the odd bit of smoke rising from the armoury. Whatever's happened in this world, my other self has been ruthless in the assault on Cronos Station.

"Give me the update."

"Seven of the twelve power linkages on the drive core have been ruptured," EDI announces over the intercom as I clamber up the emergency ladders, "it will take six hours to discharge it to safely complete repairs."

Six hours. That's a long time, and it'll take us at least twenty to recharge and return to the mass relay so we can get back to the Solar system. "Are we doing it?"

"It's already under-way, but we can only move under auxiliary thrusters until repairs have been completed."

"Understood," I say, pulling myself up on to the bridge. "The last Shepard you had here…"

"She was adamant about firing upon the station at every opportunity," Traynor says. "I think she may have let the testosterone get to her."

"Very funny, Specialist," I say, re-activating the private terminal. All my mails—my emails—are back. "How long have you known about the parallel-universe business?"

"Two days," she says, "but only after Liara melded with you—the other you. Many of the crew are still unaware—"

HOOT. HOOT. HOOT. HOOT.

That's the ship's horn, a piercing blast over the intercom and radio channels, an emergency broadcast from the fleet… god, please—

HOOT. HOOT. HOOT.

Seven blasts of the horn—the universal signal to order an immediate evacuation from the system.

"Shit… Commander!" It's Joker, and he's got that sharp tone in his voice that signals bad news.

"What is it?"

"Look at the star," he says. I peer through the viewscreen.

"What's changed?"

"Something's happening to it, energy readings are off the charts, it's burning oxygen."

Anadius is glowing a bright amber colour, its surface howling with a solar storm. "Do you think it's going supernova?" I demand.

"Jeff's predictions appear to be correct. According to—"

"Dammit, EDI, just tell me how long we have."

"Two hundred seconds, plus or minus twenty seconds."

Less than three and a half minutes, and there's no way our shields and armour will protect us from a supernova blast. Not this close. Shit. "Adams!" I call down to the engine room, "I need the FTL drives back online in three minutes or we're all dead!"

"What?"

"Anadius is about to go supernova, we need to get the hell out of here. Now."

"Aye, sir." The call clicks off, and I bark at Joker to get us out of here at best speed. There's a pang in my stomach, the same stab of guilt I got three years ago when sending Kaidan to arm the bomb, when I sent Thane into the ducts on the Collector base.

Adams is going to have to reactivate those failed power couplings manually, and he might well die in the process. Unless…

"Dammit," I say, taking off on one foot towards the back of the bridge, "I'm going down there."

"Negative, Shepard. I am heading down there myself," EDI announces.

"What? EDI," Joker bellows into the intercom, "you can't do that!"

"Jeff, if those power couplings aren't reconnected within three minutes, we'll all be dead. I still reside within the Normandy, the android is simply an avatar for the—"

"Shit, I know."

"Don't worry, Joker," I say, breathing out and returning to the seat. "She'll be fine."

"I will be fine, Jeff," she confirms, as there's a horrible rattling noise from the lower decks and the ship lurches. One of the power couplings—Adams must have already started.

"Shit, shit, shit, shit shiiiiiiit," Joker swears as he brings the Normandy about and puts the aft camera on the viewscreen.

"Time?"

"One hundred sixty seconds," EDI announces.

"Distance from Anadius?"

"Ten thousand kilometres… dammit," Jeff spits, slamming the console, "go!"

We've got two and a half minutes or we're all dead.

"How can Cerberus blow up a star?" I muse, not realising until I've finished saying it that I was saying it out loud.

"For god's sake, Commander," Joker snaps, jerking around in his chair to glare me in the eye, "Cerberus can abduct you, bring you back from the dead and replace you with alternate versions of yourself. Of course they can blow up a star."

There's a wail from the lower decks, and a pop from the aft section of the ship's bowels. "Engine room!" I bark down the intercom. "What's happening!"


Garrus slides down the ladder, breaking into a run before he's even landed and vaulting over the safety rail.

"Adams!" he yells, "get out of there!"

"No!" He's crawling along the access rails in the wall, his eyes streaked with tears and squeezed shut in the blazing light of the drive core.

Garrus follows him, tiptoeing along support struts and leaping from one conduit to another.

"I'm not sure what's got into Shepard lately," he growls as he approaches Adams and grasps him by the scruff of his neck with his free hand, "but I'd trust that man to the end of the universe."

With one arm, he tosses Adams to the balcony and barks at him to get out of here.

"No!" Adams staggers to his feet. "For god's sakes, Garrus, what are you doing? Get out of there!"


"Time?"

"T-minus thirty-five seconds."

I take a deep breath, and stare into the face of Death as its glow turns a piercing white.

"We're not going to make it, are we?" I whisper.

"Dammit," Joker snaps, and I can hear he's as close to tears as I've ever seen him.

No way out, this time: in thirty seconds that star is going to incinerate us all.


"Get out of the way!" Ash yells without thinking as she pushes past EDI's drone and thumps at the door to engineering.

Garrus. No…

He's clinging to the final support rail as the drive core screams, bracing himself against the blast of eezo and superheated ozone.

He points his omni-tool at the final broken linkage—

"Garrus!" Ash screams, and he looks up, for one moment, and shouts something—

She knows what to do. Adams is grasping the handrail—she pulls at him, dragging him from the engineering room in a fireman's lift.

"God… Garrus…"

"Quickly!" Ash yells, bracing him against the outside wall and thumping at the door control,

and there's a crack

and a flash of white

and silence.


"Shepard, the drive core is back online!"

"Thank god," I whisper. "GO, Jeff!"

The drive core cracks and squeals, and there's a flash before us—

and we're safe.

"That was close."

"Yeah." Joker engages the auto-pilot and stands, fingers trembling. "God… that was too close."

"You OK?"

"Fine," he says, leaning against his seat and taking deep breaths. I hit a button on my omni-tool and call Engineering.

"EDI, damage report…"

"Shepard!"

"Ash?"

"Get down here. Now," she says, and her voice is weak, and I can hear Adams babbling, and EDI's drone moving.

"Traynor, take the conn. Joker, you going to be OK coming with me?"

"Yeah," Joker says, clearly lying, but I don't protest as he follows me down the emergency ladders and tries to break into a run along the engineering deck corridor, falling forwards and probably breaking a leg bone somewhere. I help him up, and we stumble around the corner—

"Ashley," I whisper. It's her, administering some medi-gel to a burn on Adams's leg.

Adams…

"Shepard," and she rushes to me and I fall into her arms, nestling into her sweaty, exhausted figure.

"Who…"

"It's Garrus," she whispers.

I feel a dreadful loosening of my digestive system and close my eyes instinctively. Garrus.

I lean into Ash's face and cling to her, breathing.