Nervousness made her feel nauseous, almost like she had two heartbeats instead of one. She looked down and focused on the tea in her cup, sloshing subtly with the adroit shaking of her hands. She often felt that she chased the ideal cup of tea in her mind from table to table, the rich, thick, creamy, spicy, bittersweet, that betrayed no hint of thinness or chemical flavoring, nothing less than total, fathomless devotion to the state of being itself. Every morning she pulled a delicate cup from its brass hook and filled it, hoping that it would be dark and deep and secret as a forest, and each morning it cooled too fast, had too much milk, stained the cup, made her nervous.

She took a careful sip and set the cup down on the table, meticulous in her movements so as not to betray her mood.

She knew her body was preparing her for what was coming. Her heart beating faster, her blood pressure rising, her breathing quickened, increasing her alertness and energy. Her body was ready to fight or flee a threat by boosting her adrenaline production, but there would be no fighting this particular foe.

Taking a deep breath she felt a familiar hand squeezing hers, the warmth of it at once making her still and terrified.

"You ready?" He asked.

"No," she said.

"It's going to be okay."

No it's not. She thought.

He turned on the vid screen and dialed into his appointment.


When it was over they sat in silence for a little while, processing the news.

He knew this was coming and had tried his best to prepare himself, but sitting there in silence as two asari each clutched a hand, he wondered if maybe he hadn't prepared them enough.

His daughter rose first and made her exit quickly, trying to hide the tears in her eyes, explaining she needed some time alone.

"Okay, sweetheart." He said, and it somehow made things worse. She was so much like her mother, he thought. Kept her cards close to her chest for fear of revealing too much.

He watched her disappear down the hall and turned his attention to the sniffling asari to his left, still clutching him with one hand, wiping tears with the other.

"It's going to be okay, Liara."

"I know." She said softly. "I just – I thought –"

"Thought we'd have more time?"

"Something like that."

He reached for a tissue and offered it, squeezing her hand a little tighter, steeling himself against a tidal wave of melancholy and gloom.

So many years they had played anchor for one another, and he knew it was his role in this moment. They learned to recognize when one was lost in a sea sorrow and grief and hardened for the other, holding steadfast. It was how they got through the nightmares, the sleepless nights, the memorials, the questions, the guilt of surviving when so many others did not.

"I'm ready," he said quietly. "I'm ready now."

Her hand let go of its anchor and she drifted out to sea. Her silent weeping was the loudest thing he'd ever heard.

"I'm not." She sobbed.

He pulled her into his arms and held her shaking shoulders tight to him, his tears flowing silently down his cheeks and onto her scalp.

This was the part where he'd usually say something comforting, something inspiring and hopeful for them both to cling to. He wasn't sure what to say here, he hadn't adequately prepared.

Liara pulled away from him, reaching for more tissues and wiping her face.

"I'm sorry." She said. "I told you before, I'm not a very good asari."

"I think I'd be upset if you didn't cry."

She laughed slightly. He knew the heaviness of loss in her heart hadn't eased, but there was room there for humour, too.

"Goddess, I didn't even ask the doctor any questions."

"She said we can send them as they come up, and we have another appointment in a few days. Let's just take the time to digest this. We'll figure everything out."

She laughed again, a little more convincingly.

"You make this sound so simple."

"Well, I've done it once or twice."

This time, her laughter was genuine. He smiled and wiped a stray tear from her cheek and they sat there in each other's embrace for a while longer while their heart rates slowed to normal.

"Promise me you won't joke about dying with our daughter." She supplicated.

It was his turn to laugh but he nodded in affirmation, knowing Astraea was more serious than either of her parents. Her life to this point had been free of tragedy; this trauma would be her first.

"I'll go talk to her." He said, rising from the sofa with a grunt.

His body ached all the time now. The curse of mortality, he thought. You spend the first part of your life learning, growing stronger, more capable. And then, through no fault of your own, your body fails. You regress. Organs quit. He remembered himself in his prime, and wondered where that person went. As his wisdom and experience were peaking, his traitorous body became a prison.

Liara reached for his hand, gently, like he was made of precious glass that would crack at the slightest agitation.

"Are you alright, Shepard?"

"You know me," he smiled and bent to kiss her. "I'll be fine."


Astraea loved her bedroom. The vanity with the warped mirror, the squat chairs without armrests, the elaborate, hand-painted dressing screen. She loved curving her body into the velvet sofa, books piled at her feet, the dusty, floor-length curtains pushed back from the windows so she could see the sky. At night the purple-fringed lampshades turned the light a hue somewhere between lilac and dusky plum.

It was the same as she'd left it: a pile of cushions by her bed to read on, a stack of poetry and famous literature on her desk that she was supposed to study, and the lavender shawl and robes she'd worn the day before she left home.

She rarely stayed in her bedroom when visiting Thessia, instead staying among friends, colleagues and classmates in the common rooms. Her parents had always been supportive of that. They were so relentlessly supportive.

When her mother called there was anxiety in her voice.

"It's about your father," her mother had said.

"That can't be good." She thought aloud.

Her father was a great man, a hero, a peacemaker, a brave and good man who helped others whenever he could. When she was young, she marveled at his strength, squealed giddily when he threw her effortlessly into the air and caught her without fail. To the world he was the great Commander Shepard, but to her he was 'dad'. The man who would hide sweets in his office just for her, who would spend hours in the park watching birds in the sky, meticulously cataloguing their details, and whose models would sit idle and unfinished until she could visit and complete them with him.

I took it for granted. She thought. And now I'm out of time.

The last visit she had with her parents was more than a year ago, just before she left on tour with her performance group. When there was nothing left to do but say goodbye, she hugged him, thanked him for the hospitality, and they both agreed it had been a good visit. Tears welled up in his eyes, and she realized at that moment, it doesn't matter how old parents are, it doesn't get any easier to say goodbye.

How many times over the last forty-plus years had her dad reluctantly, with tears in his eyes, said goodbye to her?

She held a pillow close to her chest and quietly cried, in solitude and privacy, like she'd learned from her sometimes too-stoic and prideful parents.

There was a soft knock at the door and she quickly wiped her eyes.

"Hey sweetheart?"

She remembered when his voice was so much louder than it was now. When did he become so muted?

"Yeah, dad?"

Jeeze, you're not fooling anyone, Raea.

"Can I come in?"

She rolled her eyes like she had thousands of times before this; annoyed he was respecting the boundaries of her room at a moment like this.

She opened the door but couldn't meet his eyes, instead rushing back to her bed to clutch the same pillow into her chest. She's a young girl again, being lectured for breaking one of her mother's artifacts while dancing in the living room.

He sat on the edge of her bed, hands steepled, staring at the worn wooden floor. A long silence passed between them.

"Your mother told me a story once, when I was feeling really down. She told me about these two messenger birds who had been raised by the same priestess and sold to separate tribes before a great war. And they flew for many years, delivering messages to their masters during battle. And when the war was over, they were set free.

"But they didn't know where to go. They only knew war. So they flew back to where the priestess had trained them and there they found each other and their future."

"I'm assuming there's a moral to the story?"

He smiled at her over his shoulder.

"You know I asked your mother the same exact thing? She told me something like, no matter how lost you think you are, you always have a home. That home might not be in the same place always, but you'll always be able to find it."

"That's what she told you?" She sniffled.

"Swear to all the gods and goddesses."

"That's a terrible story."

"I'm probably not doing it justice."

She still couldn't meet his eyes, too afraid to see the tears he'd been hiding behind them.

"Come'ere, kiddo." He urged, opening his arms. She went willingly and held him tightly, burying her face into his shoulder and inhaling his warmth, memorizing his scent.

He was still as strong as she remembered, his arms still capable of making her feel safe and loved.

"I love you, dad." She mumbled into his shirt.

"I love you too, sweetheart."

He kissed the top of her head and stroked her back in comfort while she wiped her eyes.

"Ugh," she complained, "I'm 153 years old. It's not like I didn't know this was coming."

"It's not supposed to be easy."

"I know. I guess I just thought you'd live forever, you know?"

He laughed. His laugh was the same as it always had been.

"I kind of hoped that I would. But I've had a full life. I got to watch you grow up. I got to see you graduate. I got to see you perform and grow as an artist. I got to have so many arguments with you."

"It's not always easy, being your daughter." she snickered through her tears.

"I knew that." He said, hugging her tighter. "But it was pretty easy being your dad."

Like a sudden storm, the tears flowed without warning.

Her father could be dark. He was attracted to violence, to the basic beauty of fighting, the way it turned his body and those he fought into meticulously constructed machines.

But he also felt intensely and rejected the notion it was a symptom of weakness, instead believing it was the trademark of the truly alive and compassionate. It was not the empath who was broken, it was society that had become dysfunctional and emotionally disabled. He taught her there was no shame in expressing her authentic feelings. Never be ashamed to let your tears shine a light in this world, he told her.

He'd taught her so many things and now the lessons would cease and she would have to face the world on her own.

She wasn't ready for him to go. She wanted to beg him to fight.

Holding him tighter, she spoke the words without voicing them and she knew he would hear them in her heart.

One day, they would say their goodbyes. But for now, sitting in quiet sadness, locked in loving arms was enough for them both.


It was like his body had waited to the end of that vid call to start quitting, like it was waiting for the all-clear, for permission to shut down, pack-up, tear down its defenses. Troops always work faster when they know they're going home.

"This is your war now.' He grumbled to himself in the mirror, the fossil staring back at him had arrived so gradually, so easily he hadn't noticed. He felt ambushed by it.

'Some war,' he answered himself dismissively. 'What am I at war with? My cancer. And what is my cancer? My cancer is me. The tumors are made of me. So it's a civil war, one with a pre-determined winner.'

There were cures for some cancers, but not for his. His only had treatments and his body was too old, too broken to give much hope in that. They'd asked him if he wanted to pursue treatment, instead of what course of action. He'd considered his options, and after a few tears and tense moments, he'd laid down in surrender for the first time in his life.

His body felt leaden, like it was being pulled to the ground. That's what death is, he thought. A pull of gravity, back to where you came from.

He wasn't afraid of dying. No. He'd done that before. He was afraid of the finality, of the cold fact that he would not longer exist in the same world as his family. He'd worked so hard for it all to end in nothing. They had to move on, he knew that. But he was afraid of being forgotten, reduced to nothing, not even footnote in their long lives.

'You don't really believe that.' He reminded himself aloud.

He had wanted to leave his mark, leave a legacy, be remembered as someone and something important to those he loved. He'd become obsessed with it, not realizing that the marks he'd leave would be their scars. He'd have to be satisfied with that.

Liara called to him from the main room forcing him to hobble weakly back to his bed.

He'd catch a little hell for being out of his cushy prison without the walker close by. He was prepared, he'd faced worse foes.

She pretended not to notice him scrambling to sit upright on the bed, as if he'd never left, and he was grateful.

But she had that look on her face. That look of thoughtful analysis as if she were computing multifarious mathematical problems in her head.

"What?" He prodded.

"I just got out of a meeting with Asari High Command." She said quietly, taking a seat beside him on the bed. "They want to give you Matriarchal Burial Rites."

He paused to absorb the news. The ritual held high honour in Asari society.

"Huh." Was all he could say.

"I had a similar reaction." Liara agreed.

"I – uh – what did you tell them?"

"I told them I'd talk to you. But if I'm being honest, I think it's more than appropriate."

"I'd be the first human. The first male, wouldn't I?" He asked soberly.

"Well, you're certainly a fan of firsts."

He laughed. It hurt a little.

"Is this going to be too much? For you and Raea? I don't want to burden you with a whole thing."

"It's going to be a lot," she sighed. "But you're worth it."

Smiling, she took his hand and held it to her lips, kissing his knuckles softly.

"What about the Alliance?"

"High Command will coordinate with them on our behalf."

He nodded silently. The more he thought about it, the more sense it made. He'd spent more time among the asari on Thessia than with the Alliance or on Earth. He was human, of course, but he'd been with his bondmate nearly two hundred years, raised an asari daughter, lived among them, adopted and loved their culture.

The weight of the gesture, gifted unprompted to his family in their time of grief was overwhelming. He couldn't hold back the tears.

"So I'll tell them yes." Liara smiled, her eyes watering in sympathy.

"I really want to stop crying all the time."

"I know. Me too."

He took a deep breath and clutched at her hand.

"I don't want to go." He sobbed.

"I don't want you to go."

They were in one of those dangerous moments where they were both out to sea, neither one of them anchoring the other. They'd just have to weather the storm.

"I'm scared." He admitted.

"I know."

When he'd finally calmed and wiped the tears from his cheeks, he looked at her and found himself again in her deep blue eyes.

"It's not death that scares me so much as not being alive anymore." He began. "It's missing all the things that I would have seen. Things like her bonding, our grandchildren. I'll never see those things, and that makes me sad."

She eased onto the bed with him and wrapped him safely in her arms.

"Listen to me. As long as I draw breath anywhere, I will love you. I can't help loving you. Neither can she. You will always be there.

"I will love you always. When your black hair turned white, I still loved you. When the smooth softness of youth was replaced by the delicate softness of age, I still wanted to touch your skin. When your face became full of the lines of every smile you have ever smiled, of every surprise I have seen flash through your eyes, when every tear you have ever cried had left its mark upon your face, I treasured you all the more, because I was there to see it all. I shared your life with you, Shepard, and I will love you until the last breath leaves your body - and mine."

With that, he was a little less afraid.


He was going to die soon, you knew when you saw those eyes. There was no sign of life in his flesh, just the barest traces of what had once been a life. His body was like a dilapidated old house from which all furniture and fixtures have been removed and which awaited now only its final demolition.

Their bedroom had become a hospital in the last months of his life, but she refused to let it look like one. She insisted on changing the fresh flowers almost daily to minimize the antiseptic stench of hospice. The windows and curtains remained open to let the ocean breeze waft its scents and sounds at all times of day. Shepard loved the ocean. The briney smells and sounds of waves crashing against the stones below their terrace. She would never take this final comfort from him.

He could no longer muster the strength to speak full sentences, just breathy words here and there. It didn't matter; they'd had time to say all that needed to be said. For that she should have been thankful. She wasn't ready to be thankful just yet.

She stood and watched from the bedroom door as their daughter said her final goodbyes to her father as his doctor prepped the final medicinal cocktail that would end his life. They had picked this day as a family. Not this particular calendar day, perhaps, but their specified conditions had been met.

Shepard had demanded to die with dignity, while his mind was still intact and his suffering not yet absolute.

Today was the day, and she had dreaded it.

Approaching his bed, their bed, she placed her hand on Astraea's shoulder and squeezed supportively.

"It's time, then?" She asked, covering her mother's hand with her own.

"Yes."

Shepard had heard them and tried to smile benevolently.

Liara took a seat opposite her daughter, on the bed next to Shepard, close enough so he could feel her weight and her warmth. She knew that comforted him. She took one of his hands and urged her daughter to do the same.

She took a deep breath and steeled herself against the moment.

"Shepard, my love. Can you hear me?" Her voice was calm and assured; she had prepared herself hundreds of times for this.

When he nodded in the affirmative, she gestured to his doctor with her eyes.

"It shouldn't be long." The doctor told her as she removed the syringe from his intravenous lines.

Liara shifted on the bed, uncharacteristically nervous for what she was about to initiate.

"Shepard. We have one last moment together, in this plane and in the other. Are you ready?"

They had discussed this too, before his rapid decline. The joining would ease the passing and give them the moment they felt they deserved. The final goodbye they craved for themselves.

A look to Astraea confirmed she was ready, and Liara whispered the words she had thousands of times before.

"Eternity is a moment in time. Embrace it."


When he opened his eyes to the darkness, he felt weightless. When he looked at his arms and his hands, he saw his skin taught against hard muscle, free of scars, his body free of pain.

I must be dead. Dead or in a dream, he thought.

But she was there. Tall and proud and beautiful like always and he knew he was in the place just for them.

There was another. The other great love of his life. Youthful and carefree and yet incredibly sad. She'd never been here before. This would be the first and the last time.

I feel great. He said to them.

I know, Shepard. Liara replied. This is who you are, to us, to yourself. This is how we know and remember you.

When he looked down again, their hands were joined and he basked in the sweet feeling of it.

He could feel warmth at his back. It was comfortable and inviting, different from the first time he'd encountered the abyss.

When he looked back, the light was blinding.

Is there a light? Astraea asked.

Yeah. There's a light, sweetheart.

So they weren't lying afterall. Liara said.

Her mother never saw the light.

I have to go now, he heard himself saying.

For a second their heart skipped, like they'd forgotten the purpose of the moment.

Astraea stepped first and embraced her father, telling him she loved him and would never stop, never forget him.

You make me so proud. I'll always be here, right here for you, he said, holding her close to him.

When Astraea pulled away, Liara hurriedly filled the space.

I love you, Shepard. She said, the conviction reminiscent of the time she uttered the words in his cabin before the final assault on Earth.

I love you too, Liara.

He looked back at the light again and felt its pull on his body.

I will wait for you, do you understand? No matter how long. I will watch from beyond to make sure you live every year you have to its fullest, and then we'll have so much to talk about when I see you again.

They kissed like the had in their youth, full and passionately, like no one was watching them, as if they didn't care if someone had been. The coolness of their lips and the warmth of their mouths consoling the searing grief behind their eyes, dousing it for just a moment. A moment was all they needed. The perfect kiss in an imperfect time.

I gotta go now, Liara.

I know.

She didn't see him walk into the light, she couldn't see it at all. She hadn't been invited. Instead, he faded into the darkness, but with a smile on his face that told her everything was okay.

When she came falling back, Astraea was there to catch her.

Shepard lay on their bed, his eyes were closed, his lips parted in a delicate smile.

She made a sound half laughter half lamentation, and let grief wash over her.

In the days that followed there would be ceremonies, processions, and crowds of people wanting to pay their respects to him. But for now, she and her daughter could finally grieve, not for the soldier and hero the galaxy knew, but for the bondmate and father he had been to them.

To them, those were his most important titles, and the ones that should be honoured the most.

To them, those were his greatest legacies.