The airlock door let out a depressurized hiss and crept open. The figure of a man revealed itself with an awkward limp. A man with red hair and blue clothing. It was the ship's pilot, Jeff "Joker" Moreau. Behind him, 2 more figures emerged from the darkness, this time a turian and an asari. Garrus Vakarian and Liara T'Soni, respectively. The ship was in a state of obvious disrepair. Parts of the fuselage were missing and the engines were shot, but still intact. It's a miracle the hull held up as much as it did, given the rough impact. On one of the engines, the designation "SR-2" was emblazoned in black and blue font. On the fuselage was "NORMANDY". It was the ship of Commander Shepard, who was left behind on Earth when Admiral Hackett gave the command to evacuate the planet. Joker sat down on a nearby rock in silence. For those who know the man, this was quite uncharacteristic. He brought his hands up to his face and began to sob. Liara sat down next to Joker in an attempt to comfort him. Garrus scanned the immediate area and stepped back inside the ship.
"We're clear, for now," Garrus said on the ship's loudspeaker. There was a collective sigh of relief in the CIC. Near the GUI for the onboard galaxy map, Garrus met with Tali'Zorah, a quarian who had also accompanied Commander Shepard.
"Where are we?", asked Tali in a distressed tone.
"I have no idea. Some of the territory looks familiar, but this planet doesn't register on any of our records," Garrus said. "How bad is the damage to our engines?", he asked.
"Not as bad as we feared, but not as good as we had hoped. The drive core is still largely intact, but it's unresponsive. We need to find a way to kick it back into gear, so to say," said Tali.
"And EDI?", asked Garrus.
Tali hung her head over her shoulders. "That's the tricky part," she said. "EDI managed our drive core emissions and output, and we don't have any apparent way to do it manually. I won't bore you with the tech, but if we can't keep our emissions low, the drive core will overheat and cook every living thing down on the same deck. Between Adams and myself, devising some way to keep tabs on our emissions should be easy, it's keeping power to the engines that's the problem. I suppose that's one of the downsides to having so many of the ship's menial systems operated by an AI, even one as advanced as EDI. There's no response from the AI core. Nothing at all. It's as if she - as if EDI just... Died. Before we were hit by... Whatever that shockwave was, I was standing beside EDI in the cockpit. One moment she's there helping Joker, and the next, her body contorts at these really unnatural angles and she keels over. Joker was sitting right next to her," Tali told Garrus.
"I can't imagine how he must feel right now," Garrus replied.
"Me neither. I mean, losing someone that close to you... I was torn to pieces when my father was killed, but I don't think I could take losing you or Shepard," Tali said.
"Speaking of Shepard, I pray to the spirits that he's okay. I saw him take a nasty hit from inside the observation deck," said Garrus.
Meanwhile, back outside, Liara attempted to talk to Joker. She could see that he was pained. He knew EDI was gone.
"She'll be missed," Liara said.
"Yeah. It's just... Kind of raw, you know?", said Joker.
"Of course. I still feel great pain from the night my mother died. Sometimes I re-experience those events in my dreams," said Liara.
"I don't think I've hit that particular stage of grief yet," Joker said, in a sincere, yet clearly rigid attempt to get his regular humor back. "Do you think Shepard made it?", he asked.
"If there's anyone who will have survived this whole ordeal, it'll be Shepard. He's alive, I'm sure of it," Liara said in a reassuring manner.
"God, I hope so. I don't think I can take 2 deaths in the family," Joker said.
"Come on, we need to get you back to the ship and get ourselves off this planet," said Liara.
A few days later, in the war room, Tali found herself engaged in a conversation with Samantha Traynor, the Normandy's Communications Specialist.
"No luck trying to contact Sword?", Tali asked.
"Not a single damned bit. The QEC won't function properly without EDI," said Traynor.
Tali hung her head. "Keelah..." she said in a clearly distraught tone.
Traynor turned and looked at Tali. She couldn't see the quarian's face, but she could sense the uncertainty through Tali's suit. "But... I think I can make my own little QEC," Traynor said in a sudden realization.
Tali looked up towards Traynor. "What?", she asked. "I'm a quarian, and even I don't know how to do that," she said.
"Well, it isn't concrete, but I suppose if I could take some components from EDI's AI core, I could initiate a spontaneous parametric down-conversion. Theoretically speaking, I could take EDI's bluebox and use it to split photons focused through fiber couplers and send out a signal with it, like Morse code. No guarantees, but it could work."
"I'm a quarian. I don't know what Morse code is," Tali said.
"Oh, right. Basically, it's just a sequence of signals transmitted along a wire via a series of sequential button presses. Only here, there's no wire."
"But one QEC can only communicate directly with one other QEC at any given time. Assuming this device of yours even works, how do you plan on getting somebody's attention?", Tali asked.
"I haven't figured that part out yet. I suppose I could just transpose the signal through different relay channels and hope I get an open line. I couldn't make any calls of my own, but I can cut into a call in progress. There's no telling how strong the 'connection' would be though, the entangled particles could just as easily fall out of alignment," said Traynor.
"Well, we have to do something soon. Our food stores are fine for now, but they won't last forever," Tali said.
"I promise you, Tali, we'll get out of here," Traynor said, placing her hand on Tali's shoulder in reassurance.
One floor lower, near the engines, a prothean sat in quiet contemplation. He had been sitting there for a number of hours. He held a small object in his hand. It was the Echo Shard that Commander Shepard had made him re-experience. He was reliving the memories contained within once more, trying to come to terms with his past actions. The muscles around his 4 eyes twitched in anxiety, and he could feel his grip on the shard tightening. Suddenly, a voice rang out from behind him, "Javik?", it said. The prothean didn't seem to hear it. The voice belonged to Liara. On top of being the Shadow Broker, she was also a leading scholar on the protheans. "Javik?", she called out again, this time placing one of her hands on Javik's shoulders. She could see that he was uncomfortable. From the corner of her eye, she saw the shard in his hand. she knocked the shard from his grasp, and Javik came reeling back to the present.
"You. Asari. Why do you disturb my meditation?", Javik asked as he rose to his feet, between strained breaths. The shard had worn him out physically.
"I just wanted to let you know that we may have found a way to get off the planet and back to Earth," Liara said.
"Good. I will not die here. Not surrounded by primitives," Javik said. He felt a sharp pain in his hand. He looked down and saw that his palm was bleeding. He had been gripping the shard so firmly that it had cut him.
Liara furrowed her brow and looked at Javik in a stern demeanor. "I am getting very tired of you constantly referring to me and everyone else as 'primitive'," she said.
"It is what you are. Nothing more, nothing less," Javik stoicly replied.
"We didn't need to free you from that stasis pod, you know. We could have left you there to sleep for another 50,000 years and die from power failure," said Liara.
"And perhaps it would have been for the best. At least then I could be reunited with my people again, instead of trapped here on a lifeless planet with your incessant complaining about my conduct. Tell me, who have I harmed with my words?", Javik said,
Liara softened her composure, if only slightly. Javik did have a point. she knew that they were just words, and didn't have any real power. "I... I'm sorry," she said. "I sometimes forget that you are alone. That doesn't completely excuse your actions, though."
"I accept your apology, and perhaps I should apologize myself," said Javik, slightly backing down. "Your cycle did what mine could not. The Reapers are no more. That alone is a testament to your abilities as a species and as a community. Perhaps I have been too... Difficult with your people," he said, clearly uncomfortable with the display of compassion.
Liara relaxed her composure and a small grin formed on her face.
"I'm glad we could reach an understanding, then," she said, extending a hand towards Javik, which the prothean took.
One floor up, an audible wince could be heard from the mess hall. It came from the medical bay. Lieutenant Steve Cortez had just been given a shot of morphine by the ship's doctor, Karin Chakwas.
"There we are. The pain should subside in just a moment," she said with a sense of certainty. Doctor Chakwas' omni-tool began to buzz on her arm. She looked down at it. "Ah, time to force feed Joker his medicine. I swear, he's like a 9-year old turning away cough syrup," she said.
That made Cortez chuckle. "It can't be any worse than having him in the passenger seat," he said. Cortex continued, "He complains worse than James after the Maestros lose a game of biotiball."
Chakwas let out a laugh. She heard the sound of footsteps coming from outside the medbay. "Speaking of James, I believe he's coming," she said.
The door slid open and James Vega walked through the threshold.
"Hey Esteban, hey Doc," he said, looking in their respective directions.
Doctor Chakwas turned to James and said, "I need to step out for a moment. Look after Cortez here, will you?"
"Sure thing," he said in compliance, and Chakwas left.
James paced around the room and took a seat next to Cortez. There was a modestly awkward silence between the two.
"You know, Esteban, I gotta say... I mean, I know that sometimes I give you a lotta shit, but... Well... You're my best friend, along with the Commander. You got no idea how quickly my heart was racing when I saw your shuttle go down in London," James said.
"Heh. Turns out that beneath your surly exterior, there's a heart of gold after all, Mr. Vega," Cortez replied in a sarcastic manner.
"Yeah. Besides, you owe me 20 credits on that championship game. No way in hell am I letting you die without paying up," said James, returning the sentiment.
"I wouldn't have it any other way," Cortez said with a smirk.
"Esteban... I mean this in the most platonic, friend-oriented way possible, but... I love you, man," James said.
Cortez started to laugh. "It's about time you let me know, Mr. Vega. And here I was beginning to think you didn't like me," he said.
"Yeah yeah, real funny. Don't let it go to your head," said James in a dismissive tone.
It would only be a matter of time before the crew of the Normandy was reunited with their friends and loved ones.