"Let's all agree to never do that again."
"Agreed." Shepard stared at Nihlus, waiting for the upside down Spectre to stop spinning. "Ow. Who builds a relay within striking distance of buildings?" She craned her head but couldn't see Garrus for frantically kicking rachni legs. She took a quick inventory, finding a few places that had complaints, but nothing major. "Hey, C-Sec, you breathin'?"
"Yeah." Garrus grunted then cursed. "Although, I'd be better if I didn't have a rachni queen flailing against my personal bits." She heard his armour banging against the hull as he tried to wriggle loose.
A loud, metallic thump from the pilot's side dragged her attention to Legion. The geth lay sprawled on the shuttle's ceiling, but quickly gathered itself and stood.
"Shepard-Captain, do you require assistance?" The geth crouched beside her.
"Yeah, help me not break something getting out of this harness." She waited until Legion grabbed hold of her shoulders and legs then undid the buckle. Although not an entirely graceful way out of her seat, at least it stopped her from slamming head-first into the roof.
"Are you injured?" it asked, helping her sit up.
"No. Go help the others. We've got to get out of here and hijack a car." Crawling between the seats, she managed to duck the queen's flailing limbs to force the hatch open. "Well, we're upside down after slamming into the tower and flipping over, but hey, we're on the Citadel." Dragging herself out, Shepard scrambled to her feet, then turned to help Nihlus crawl free of the wrecked shuttle.
"Amalair," she called, crouching in the hatch, "I apologize, but this extraction is not going to be big on dignity." She elbowed Nihlus. "Grab a leg. Let's just try not to do any major damage." She grabbed hold of the rachni queen's leg as close to the body as she could manage. "Legion, do you have an angle to push?"
"Affirmative."
Together, the three of them managed to wrestle the queen loose, then Legion went back in to help Garrus.
"Okay." Shepard sorted her armour and shrugged Roger into her hand. She turned a slow circle, letting out a low whistle. "Sweet baby Jesus, C-Sec and the Marines have had a hell of a fight on their hands." She offered her hand to Garrus as he crawled out, looking back to the destruction even as he pulled himself up. "Come on, we've got to keep moving."
Dead krogan, Marines, and C-Sec lay strewn like refuse over barricades, filling her with a deep, aching sorrow. None of them deserved to be there. Even the krogan were just pawns, sent to die without being given a choice or knowing why. She choked back her reaction; it wouldn't serve to do anything but slow her down. She set out, jogging past fires reaching up into the false sky from cars shot down to lie in battered heaps amidst the lakes and gardens. As she headed toward the tower, hoping to find a car in working order, Shepard noted the lack of civilian casualties. It looked as though C-Sec had been given enough notice to clear out the streets at least.
"C-Sec shuttle," Garrus called, jabbing his rifle in the direction of the vehicle. It stood in a garden just outside the wards access, which looked to have provided it some cover.
"Brilliant." Shepard veered to follow him, catching movement in the corner of her eye in the fraction of a second before a rocket exploded against her shields, throwing her into the air. After a moment of flight, she crashed into a railing and flipped over, landing butter side down in a patch of hibiscus. For a second, she lay stunned, every cell in her body aching and vibrating from being hit by the equivalent of a small bus.
Thank the sweet baby Jesus for shields.
Gunfire broke through the ringing in her ears. She shook her head, trying to clear away the strange, quivering layer over her eyesight, then clambered up onto her hands and knees.
"Shepard!" Nihlus called out, "are you all right?" Why did he always have to sound as though he was shouting from a half klick away?
"Yeah." She fished Roger out of the shrubberies and turned him on the krogan with the rocket launcher. "I think it rattled all my teeth loose, but I'm still moving."
Three more krogan joined the first, but at least only the one had a ML-77 launcher. She ducked down behind the railing, giving her shields time to recover.
"Is everyone else okay?" she called. Even as she asked, she felt the strange musical whispers of the queen moving through the air. They latched onto her guts like hooks, pulling at her to put down her guns and be calm. A grim smile scarred her face, guilt raking her with its claws as she called, "Press the advantage. We can't afford to fight our way across this damned station."
She unhooked three grenades from her belt, throwing them into the krogan line even as their fire slowed. "C-Sec, get your ass in that shuttle and get it up and running!" The grenades tore down the krogan shields, so she switched to Ingrid, lining up headshots as quickly as she could without overheating her gun. "Come on, go down, you bastards."
As she spoke, the sun went out, but she couldn't spare a glance for the sky. Instinct told her—pure, hysterical, primitive terror told her—what eclipsed the artificial sun, but two krogan still fought, advancing on Nihlus and Legion who covered the queen. They were trying to herd her down the stairs to the wards, but they didn't need to worry. The krogan stopped firing and stood, faces slack, held rapt by her song.
"I'm going to regret this," she sighed, pulling the last grenades. "Duck and cover, people!" She pulled her arm back. "Forgive me." She threw them, then dove behind the railing and hit the trigger.
"They're down," Nihlus hollered. "Let's move, Sovereign's incoming on the tower."
Shepard popped up from behind her cover, she saw the Spectre staring straight up, but she didn't spare a glance for the Reaper. Instead, she raced for the shuttle. Why weren't the thrusters firing? Why … ?
Garrus appeared in the hatch. The expression on his face told her everything she needed to know, so she changed course. Fifty thousand years of planning, hard work, and suffering had gone into making sure that Sovereign didn't turn the Citadel into a Hellgate, and in a very few minutes, all of that would go straight to down the toilet.
"C-Sec will have a defensive line at the embassy," she called back. "They should have a working shuttle there." Shepard picked up the pace, ignoring the nettle-sting of rising panic under her diaphragm. "Someone grab that damned rocket launcher. We're probably going to need it."
"Keelah, is that our brand new shuttle upside down at the tower?" a familiar voice called, crackling and broken as it tore through the jamming. "Shepard, they're going to stop letting you have nice toys if you just keep breaking them."
Shepard spun around to see a Kodiak racing toward them at breakneck speed. Grinning, she reached up to open the channel. "Tali? What in the name of the holy Enkindlers is a nice girl like you doing in a warzone like this?" Shepard backed away, more and more quickly as the shuttle closed without slowing. "And who taught you to drive?"
"Saving your backside is what I'm doing." The shuttle stopped suddenly and dropped straight down. "And no one taught me to drive. I just watched you."
Only the rachni queen didn't dodge for cover as the shuttle slammed into the ground.
"Remind me to get you some remedial training," Shepard said as she ran over. She opened the hatch. "Come on people, we've got a lift."
"Driven by a drunk hanar," Nihlus grumbled as he stepped inside. He sat and strapped himself in. "Tali'Zorah, as glad as I am to see you, maybe you should let Garrus drive."
Shepard helped the rachni queen on board, then shut the hatch and ducked into the pilot compartment. "Thanks for stopping by," she said, grinning as a giddy relief swept through her, sunshine racing in behind windswept clouds. A second later, Tali lifted off, the shuttle shooting straight up faster than the inertial dampeners could compensate and sending Shepard scrambling to stay on her feet. The relief died in a flash of dizziness. They were all going to die before they made it to Sovereign at that rate.
Tali glanced back. "Did you think I'd come all this way with you and miss taking down Sovereign?" she replied, scoffing. "No chance." She looked back at the controls just in time to dodge a rocket launched from the ground, sending Shepard crashing to the floor behind the pilot seat.
"Ow." Shepard scrambled back up onto her feet. "Yeah, I'm thinking Garrus should be driving, Tali. We need to fly into the superstructure. It's going to get a little hairy."
Tali grumbled, but slipped sideways to let Garrus slide in behind her. "Fine, but I get complete credit for the big save this time." She paused then slanted one slender shoulder in a vague shrug. "Well, Kal can have a little of it."
Shepard brushed a quick kiss against the cheek of the quarian's helmet as Tali squeezed by to take a seat. "Absolutely." The captain turned to Tali's copilot. "Kal'Reegar, I'm glad as hell to see you, but I need to boot you out of your seat too." When he moved, she flopped in and entered the Conduit's signature into the nav computer.
"Okay, Brother C-Sec, let's follow that blip." She did up her harness and brought the weapons online just in case.
Garrus sent the shuttle looping high above the presidium, heading for the outer edge of the ring. It felt like going the wrong direction, but Shepard left it to the C-Sec agent's superior knowledge of the Citadel. At least it seemed like the wrong direction until they cleared the ring and the immense bulk of Sovereign reared over them, millions of years worth of the collective nightmares of every race.
For a moment, her blood turned to paste in her veins, but then she gritted her teeth and pressed her eyes closed. "If there was ever a time to prove that monster wrong, now would be it," she whispered under her breath. She cracked her neck and steadied her hands on the firing controls. Even if God had abandoned her, even if He'd turned a blind eye to the pleas of billions of voices calling out to Him in thousands of languages, she was there. She had a chance to end it, and she wouldn't let her own cowardice destroy that.
They entered the presidium ring so close to Sovereign's underbelly that it felt as if she should be able to reach out the door and run her fingers along that black, oil-on-water hull.
"It gets tight," she said, mostly just needing to hear her own voice for a second, "but Tashac got a small frigate through, so we should be fine."
Garrus glanced over, his mandibles flicking ever so slightly. "Don't worry, Shepard. I've got you."
She grinned, and turned to her nav panel, updating the station's overlay. "There it is again, C-Sec, that delusional streak."
"When it comes to you, always," he said, his voice low enough to stay between them and rumbling deep in his chest in a way that made her heart stop and then start fluttering like a hummingbird's wings.
"Stop that," she grumbled, half-heartedly. "You're going to give me a heart attack." And yet, something inside her that had been floating loose, crashing around with her every movement and every thought, settled, anchoring itself. For all she teased him, he had her.
They encountered no resistance on the way through the superstructure until they came to the huge doors leading into the chamber where Sovereign had been born. Garrus set them down at the doors, Shepard leaping free of her harness even before it landed.
"Everyone, guns at the ready. I'll be a monkey's blind, fat aunt if there isn't a small herd of krogan on the other side of this door." She waited until her people stood behind her, then turned and opened the hatch.
Try as she might to ignore them, Tashac's memories burst free of Shepard's control, flooding her with the fear and sadness the Prothean had felt upon seeing the now pristine floors covered with the bodies of so many races, the Keepers sorting through them like workers on some grisly mass production line … Attit and Merol's presence at her back, giving her courage even as her own failed. The loneliness … and the hope.
Shepard grabbed onto the last and pushed the rest back, forcing Tashac behind her wall. She couldn't concentrate with two sets of thoughts rolling around in her head, and if she couldn't concentrate, they were all very, very dead.
Gathering herself, focusing on the task, she skirted around the shuttle, heading for the door. "Cover me, I'll crack it open."
The team moved like water, effortlessly flowing into positions to cover the door as Shepard ran to the panel. She expected it to be locked, and it didn't disappoint. "And that's why God made engineers," she whispered, cracking the panel open. She overrode the door controls in under five seconds, the giant gears grinding and roaring as they began to move for what was likely the first time in fifty thousand years. "And made us awesome," she crowed.
She ducked behind the rear panel of the shuttle, giving Garrus a cocky grin as she took cover next to him. "Not a real engineer, my ass."
He just shook his head. "Never letting that one go, are you?"
Unfortunately, rounds interrupted her witty comeback, four krogan spilling out the door in an undisciplined charge. One of them slammed into the front of the shuttle hard enough to knock both Shepard and Garrus on their asses, but the behemoth also knocked himself senseless. Tali and Nihlus's shotguns tore into its head, pulverizing it into a pulpy, shredded mass. A shot from Ingrid between its nonexistent eyes put it out of its misery.
That left three.
"Shepard, Vakarian, Tali," Nihlus called. "Bring down their shields. I'll handle the rest of it." He brought the rocket launcher up, couching it in against the angle of his shoulder.
Three overloads tore along the krogan's shields, bringing them down with an impressive light show. Not two seconds later, rockets sizzled through the air, slamming into the krogan before they could spread out, each blast damaging all three. They went down without a sound, their unnatural silence saying everything about the wrongness of their origin and being.
"Krogan should go out roaring in defiance," she muttered, choking down a hard lump of pity. Just one more sin to chalk up on the Reaper's endless tally. Did God, or the universe, or karma even have a sufficient punishment for the horrors the Reapers had inflicted? In the end, she supposed it didn't matter. Saving the living would even the scales enough for her. As long as the harvests ended, she could let the dead sort the rest of it out.
She burst out of cover, dashing forward to the door, checking through for any more surprises. Nothing. She scowled at that. Was it arrogance, supreme confidence that made Saren leave his back so wide open? Four krogan to stop her? Surely, he knew better.
"He's just slowing us down," Nihlus said, stepping up beside her. "He wants us there at the end. Or Sovereign does." He shrugged, a quick, barbed jerk of his shoulders. He strode through the door, passing her like a storm, all lightning and thunder. She grabbed his hand, stopping him. He squeezed her fingers, a little of the electricity dissipating. "I'm okay, Shepard. Just ready to end this. Spirits, am I ready to end this."
She nodded and released him. "Feels like we've been fighting for fifty thousand years." Looking back, she said. "Tali, Kal, stay here, and watch our backs. Make sure the path out of here stays open. Protect Amalair." She crooked her finger at Garrus and Legion. "You two can keep an eye on the canyon from the archway." Following Nihlus, she lifted into a jog, keeping her eyes carefully averted from the open chasm where Tashac had stared into the darkness, letting it in to eat away her soul.
She paused just inside the arch, turning back to look into Garrus's eyes. Damn, those ice-blue eyes. They pulled at her, but she shut that down too. The fight had always been coming down to her and Nihlus. She needed Garrus to get out and keep things moving if everything went FUBAR with the Conduit. With the shuttle, the rest of the team had a chance to make it to the Normandy and then to the relay.
"Here's your position, gentlemen. Keep our retreat open, and if anything goes too enormously wrong up there, get Tali, Kal, and Amalair to the Normandy. Joker already knows to bug out if Reapers start pouring through that relay, but he'll be waiting for you." She smiled as Garrus's mandibles and brow plates dropped, seeing the realization slice through him that she was going on and leaving him behind. She wished she could break down and tell him how naked her back would feel without him there. That she could tell him … .
"Keep a weather eye. We'll be back," was what came out.
Tearing herself away from the stare that begged her to let him have her back, the one that told her how much she was loved, she turned to the ramp leading down. God, she hoped she was coming back. She really wanted to see where that whole thing was headed. What if it had lasted, and they managed to grow old together? Wouldn't that have been something?
"Shepard!" Garrus made as if to follow her, but she turned back, slicing the air with her hand to still his protest.
"No, stay here and protect the others, Garrus. I don't want you exposed to that thing." She gave him a tight-lipped smile. "I'll be back in a few minutes, then we'll find ourselves a nice restaurant that hasn't been shot to hell." She began backing down the slope into that fabricated canyon. "Or … maybe we'll order in pizza. Tomorrow, I could even make you breakfast."
He followed her a couple of steps. "I still don't trust you not to poison me." He held out a hand, talons reaching for her. "Come back."
She winked, her eyes hungrily moving over his face, hoarding and packing away everything she saw there, storing it down deep for safe keeping. Just in case. "Count on it." Another step and she turned, running down the slope. "Come on, Brother Nihlus, get your assless in gear. We've got a harvest to stop, glory hallelujah."
A small squad of krogan moved down into the low spot from the platform ahead, but between Nihlus's new-found love affair with the rocket launcher, and her overload, they made short work of them. Still, would have been nice to have Wrex or Sparky along to fling them over the edge.
When she reached the bottom, she put rounds through their brainstems, making sure they didn't regenerate and come up on them from behind. That battlemaster on Therum still haunted her every time she faced a krogan, and heaven knew Wrex could take a licking and keep coming back for more. That was so not the time for taking chances.
As they climbed the other side, Nihlus dropped the rocket launcher, trading for his shotgun. Ahead, Shepard could see the faint energy wrinkle of a barrier blocking access to the platform, and beyond that, the Conduit raised slowly into the air, lifting to seat itself into its nest of controls. For a second, the sight sent a thousand splinters of panic slicing through her. How could they stop it in time?
Doesn't matter, Janey. Just keep working the problem.
"Sovereign, the Conduit is in place," she heard Saren call out as they reached the barrier. "What are your orders?"
"Your purpose has been fulfilled," the soulless monotone replied, its words glacial and dark as they boomed over them. "Your utility is at an end, your mind too damaged to be of use."
Saren stared up at the Reaper for long seconds before he turned to look at Shepard and Nihlus. Although his face showed no emotion, his mandibles pulled in tight, his brow plates still, his mouth hung open ever so slightly, and his back bowed as if a load too heavy to bear had knocked the breath out of him.
Although too filled with anger and disgust to allow it, Shepard wished she could feel at least empathy for the fallen Spectre. She knew how it felt to witness god turn its back. Stepping up to the shield, she pressed her hand to it. The darkness lashed at her, and she winced as the coils of its whip tore into her but didn't fight the pain. She didn't need to fight it. The pain and darkness already lived so far down inside her that her entire being had formed around it like a tree's flesh growing around a nail.
"I was afraid you wouldn't make it in time, Shepard … Nihlus," Saren called, his voice that same even, rational tone. Perhaps too much of him had been eaten away by the indoctrination to even feel Sovereign's betrayal.
"I always got excellent marks for punctuality in school." Shepard craned her head, trying to see if she could find a way around the barrier. Nothing showed.
He took a couple of steps toward them. "I think the three of us have known from the beginning that it would end like this." Those horrible, glowing eyes turned to Nihlus. "You've lost, you know that don't you? In a few minutes, Sovereign will send the signal to the Conduit. The relay will open. The Reapers will return."
Nihlus stepped up beside Shepard, as sharp and brittle as glass shards in liquid nitrogen. "We still have a few tricks up our sleeves."
Saren's mouth opened, but he hesitated over his next words, and when they came out, the tone flattened. "Sovereign has recognized your value. You've both impressed it. Surrender to the Reapers, and you will be spared."
Shepard laughed, the sound cracking the air like a gunshot even over the noise of the Citadel and Sovereign moving overhead. "You think we're going to buy that line after hearing you get the royal kiss off? Seriously?" She slammed a fist against the barrier. "Let us through this fucking thing, and we'll give Sovereign a kiss off that he'll remember for about twenty seconds before his ass gets blown out through his weird tentacle-leg-finger-things."
"Don't you understand, Shepard?" Saren called. He spread his arms out to the galaxy. "Every cycle there are hundreds like you. Hundreds who fight back, who organize and resist. They find every single one of you and destroy you from the inside out then turn you on your own people. You aren't special. You aren't mighty, and in the end, they will reduce you to dust, just like the thousands before you."
"Saren." She reached out a hand. "It's not too late. We can counteract the effects of indoctrination, mostly. You have so much intel that could help us prepare." A wrecking ball slammed through the wall of anger, allowing empathy, and worse … a gut-twisting sympathy to wash through—cold, clear waters pouring through a dam.
"The most crushing blow … and yet the most precious gift a warrior can be given," Tashac whispered through Shepard's thoughts, "is the moment of crystal clarity when hatred clears to reveal that the enemy is a shadowy reflection of oneself. For all their deeds, they are neither superior nor inferior, just beings seeing the infinite complexities of the universe through a different glass. In that moment, you fall in love, and it breaks your heart. All killing diminishes the whole. All of it."
Shepard pushed that aside and lifted a beseeching hand to the barrier. "Please, help us. I get it. Your best chance for salvation just kicked you in the ass. I've been there. Use it."
"Saren!" Nihlus stepped up beside her. A soft, rumbling keen underscored his words. "Listen to her. You were led along the wrong path trying to save our people. I understand that. What Shepard and I are doing could actually save them. If we can stop Sovereign from opening the relay, we could delay them for cycles … give ourselves a chance to prepare."
Saren shook his head. "No. Like I said, Nihlus … thousands like you. It always turns out the same. They are too many and too strong." He laughed, but it came out a warbling sort of keen. "What I didn't realize is that every cycle, there are also thousands like me. Pawns twisted by indoctrination to believe they are doing what is best. In the end, we die ground into dust just as fine as the ones who fight."
His eyes turned to look at the Conduit. "It's just about seated. When it reaches full power, Sovereign will open the arms and beam a signal through the Conduit into dark space. It will last exactly forty-five seconds." As he spoke he backed up to the edge of the platform. Stepping up onto the low barrier around the edge, Saren pulled his pistol from his hip.
"Saren?" Nihlus ran up a step, slamming into the barrier. "Saren! Don't. Please."
"I knew what you were the moment I saw you in that mine, filthy and ragged. I knew that one day, you'd eclipse me. I kept you angry, kept you raging against your mother and the galaxy, because I knew that was the only way to hold you back." His mandibles spread and fluttered hard. "You are so much more, Nihlus. Let go of your anger." The glowing, blue stare turned to Shepard. "That one will show you how limitless you are."
The Spectre activated his omnitool, keyed in commands, then lifted his gun. "Watch your back, Shepard," he said. "They'll be coming for you. You forced their hand."
"Saren, no. Nihlus is—" Shepard slammed her fists against the barrier.
"It's too late for me, Shepard." He leaned back, a talon touching a control on his omnitool, dropping the shield protecting the Conduit, as the gun travelled past it to his chest. Two reports hammered through the air, a mist of indigo blood exploding outward as the bullets tore through his heart. Saren fell backwards off the platform, his body tumbling through the awkward, partial gravity.
Shepard fell forward onto her hands and knees as the shield dropped. She scrambled up and ran forward, reaching out, but too late. Eventually, the gravity of one of the wards would snag him, but it didn't matter. Saren was dead, buying peace and perhaps absolution the only way he knew how.
"I as free forgive you as I would be forgiven: I forgive all," she whispered, Jenkins's last words whispering through her, a gentle breeze of understanding.
Shepard turned from Saren's corpse and ran up to the Conduit interface. They had a much bigger problem ahead. "Oh god. Okay. We know that they sabotaged this thing to do something, right?" She looked over at Nihlus, desperate stare begging him to know what they were supposed to do. "Do you remember? Anything?"
He shook his head and raced to her side, looking over her shoulder. "It's like Merol dumped the information out of his memory." He threw up his hands. "Forty-five seconds is a hell of a short window, Shepard."
"Bloody lot of good you are to me," she snapped without any heat. She looked up, Sovereign's massive form hidden by the platform's roof. Still, the horrible insect legs scraped and ground against the tower above them, a cacophony of metal on metal that hammered spikes into her gums and set her teeth grinding. "Tashac knew she was indoctrinated. She couldn't stop them from using her to sabotage the base, but maybe she managed to keep this locked away from them."
She reached up for her radio, then realized the uselessness of that gesture. Even if the Conduit wasn't jamming all their signals, Amalair didn't use a radio. Her heart fell, splashing into a chill, slimy hopelessness that sloshed in the pit of her belly. She reached back and gripped Nihlus's hand. "Go, open the arms. If I fail, maybe the fleets can still take that thing down." Releasing him, she laid her hands on the interface, hoping some spark of inspiration would strike.
Nihlus leaned down over her and nuzzled her ear. "If we don't survive this … thank you, Shepard."
She let out a bitter cough of laughter, the boggy hopelessness splashing up. "For what? Getting everyone in the galaxy killed?"
"For the best few months of my life." He strode to the console before she could reply.
Pressing her eyes closed, Shepard searched, rifling through thoughts and memories, tearing at the wall she'd erected around Tashac with desperate, bleeding fingers. The answer was there. It had to be there. The Prothean spent fifteen cycles creating a way to make sure Sovereign could be stopped. Surely, Tashac would have found a way to pass the information on.
"Come on," she growled. "You were strong enough to fend the darkness off for more than fifteen years. You're strong enough to help me figure this out."
Inside her mind, the oil-slick oozed out of its carefully partitioned area, millions of microscopic legs skittering and scrambling, racing along her neurons. They laughed, cold and pointed, mocking her desperation and fear as the bit and chewed. "Thousands like you throughout history," they whispered. "Thousands and thousands over the millions of years since the cycles began, and here you are poised on the edge of the great abyss that took them all."
Shepard scraped the back of her glove across her brow and pulled back from the interface. She had a picture in her head of the moment Tashac turned away from the Conduit in the chamber under the base. She'd opened something to expose inner workings. A panel.
Climbing up to within arm's reach as the Conduit seated itself and began to power up, Shepard circled its heinous form, running gloved fingers over the surface, searching. Touching the thing exhumed a long-buried corpse: ancient, clotted, and dirty. So very dirty. The kind of filth that made it so no one could ever bear to touch her again. If they did, they'd feel the depth of that mark, recoil and turn their backs on her. No amount of time, no number of deeds noble or great could clean away a taint like that, it could only be borne until it eventually ate the sufferer alive. One day, Shepard's would eat her alive.
The darkness crawled over everything, leaching all colour from the world. The gelid sludge crawled out of her belly to ooze over her organs, easing her down into its embrace. 'What will you have? What will the darkness allow you to keep?' it asked. She knew the answer. It would allow her nothing. She'd fight until the moment she died, never discovering victory, never knowing peace. Was there any point to fighting a battle she could never win?
"It's okay, Janey," her father whispered in her ear. She whimpered a little as the warmth of his breath seeped through the hood. "If you need to let go … ." A sob tore from his throat, but he cleared it as if it was just another breath. "… it's okay. You've fought so hard, been so very brave. I know it hurts, baby, so if Jesus calls you home …" Gentle pressure dimpled the hood, pushing it against her skin. "… you can go. Your mom and I understand, and one day we'll all be together at His—"
"Shepard?"
She looked up at Nihlus, his voice breaking through the litany of hopelessness inside her head, his famila notas bright and gorgeous in the dim light. He really was beautiful, particularly right then. Beautiful and so very alive. So very there, despite everything they'd been through over the weeks. Clinging to that, she asked, "Please tell me Garrus gave you those injections? I really need one right now."
He tossed her a syringe. She snatched it out of the air, yanked the cap and pressed it to her neck, then threw it away. "Thanks."
Then she saw it, right where her hand had been, and she laughed, throwing off the chill. "Oh ho, afraid are you, you bastard? Nice trick, putting the whammy on me like that." She opened her omnitool and fabricated a tool to pry the cover off the panel. There, in the center, sat a very familiar-looking black rectangular component. She grinned and called out, "So, Legion, I probably shouldn't touch this one, either, should I?"
Despite her words, she reached in, closing her hand—
"I have dedicated a great many cycles to installing this backdoor. I hid it within the work that the darkness commanded I perform. It is not the miracle I wished to leave for the one who follows in my footsteps, but it will have to suffice. I have laboured for cycles to alter the Reaper technology or sabotage it, but it defies even the miracles that Merol can force the galaxy to perform. Instead, I have simply wired in a small amplifier and transmitter.
"When the Vanguard transmits the signal for the Conduit to open the relay, a feedback loop will return along the same pathway, thus bypassing the Vanguard's defenses. For those brief moments, the feedback will cripple the Reaper's sensory processes and disrupt its defenses.
"I pray that whomever discovers my work possesses the armada to destroy the Vanguard during those moments. If not, the relay will still open and the cycle will begin anew. If, however, the Vanguard meets with its destruction while transmitting, the Conduit will be destroyed as well. It will not save the galaxy, but it will buy precious time to prepare, and the Citadel will be closed to them as a means of return. I just pray it is enough."
—on the small box.
"Shepard, the arms are opening," Nihlus called. "Fair bet that Sovereign knows something is up." He glanced over at her. "You okay?"
"Better than okay. This thing is seconds from hitting full power. Can you get me a channel to Hackett? We need a crazy-ass amount of precision here." She opened her omnitool, setting it to scan the receiver. "Just get me a line through the jamming, or we're going to be oh so very royally fucked. I really don't want a front row seat for a Reaper invasion today."
Nihlus keyed commands into the console, then tossed a glance back over his shoulder and shrugged. "It's scratchy, but you should be able to get something through."
"Admiral Hackett? Are you receiving?" Static and a harsh clicking sound answered her. "Shepard to Hackett, please come in."
"… eading you, Shepard. What's … status?"
"We've reached the Conduit. It's rigged to help bring down Sovereign's defenses. When I signal, the fleets need to open fire on the Reaper. All of them. We have a forty-five second window to take that thing down. Do you read?" She shouted, praying that he got enough of the message to pass the orders along.
"Understood. All fleets … on Sovereign when … receive your signal. Standing by."
Shepard kept her eyes on the scan, watching the power level climb. The readings spiked a half second later as Sovereign's transmission funneled through the Conduit. Around them, the Citadel began to shake, a deep resonating tremor that let her know the relay awakened. She opened the channel. "Now, sir. Admiral Hackett, do you read? Now!"
She ran to the edge of the platform, looking out. The ward arms had reached about a sixth of the way open, but already, ships poured through. Alliance, geth, and quarian vastly outnumbered the vessels of the Citadel fleet.
Then, like a firefly against a jet-black sky, the Normandy soared in, racing at the head of the attack wave. It strafed the Reaper with its canons and darted away, but not before the terrible, klaxon roar of the massive laser sounded. The deadly beam missed the Normandy to punch through one of the Alliance ships, slicing the frigate in half. Fire plumed in a horrible cloud, alive and fierce, the ship screaming defiantly in the face of death for a single moment before it expired.
Like a crowd willing to stand back and watch a fight until the bully took down one of their friends, the fleets opened fire, missiles and cannons tearing into the Reaper. Beautiful, terrible birds of prey darted and dove, reeling through the ether in intricate formations, sweeping in and away from that deadly but cumbersome laser. Shepard soared alongside them. The inferno of a near miss seared along her spine followed by the exhilaration of holding the attack until the last possible second, then rolling into a sharp climb along the Reaper's enormous body, guns pouring out death and destruction.
At their head soared the most beautiful of the metal avians, her silver hull gleaming in the light of the nebula, reflecting the death throes of her less able fellows in brilliant gold, amber, and crimson. Shepard clung to the edge of the platform, leaning out as her ship danced. Her heart climbed up into the back of her throat, and she held her breath as if the Normandy needed all of her, even her air, in order to survive the monster that tried to snuff her out.
Seemingly aware that the little frigate was Shepard's vessel, or perhaps merely because it proved the most vexing target, Sovereign's laser lashed out time and again, trying to carve up the nimble ship. Each time Joker worked his magic, vanishing from the laser's path.
Gradually, over the sounds of battle, Shepard registered a noise, a faint whine where none had existed before, but, captivated by the artistry of Hackett's attack, she let it build. Then Sovereign relinquished the Citadel, thrusters roaring as it fled for the opening arms and the relay beyond that.
Shepard screamed, a vicious bellow of victory, and punched her fist at the fleeing Reaper. "Run, you bastard. Run all you want, you're not getting away." She laughed as her prediction came true, the ward arms not yet open wide enough to allow the massive ship to escape. The laser roared, the terrible dragon bellow that she remembered from Feros, but this time, it provoked no superstitious terror. They'd pulled the dragon's teeth.
The Reaper opened fire at the end of one of the ward arms, trying to make a big enough hole. But, a swarm of angry bees protecting their nest, the fleets chased the dragon down, hammering away at it until the Reaper's shields failed. The dying god's skin cracked under the deluge of munitions, flame and smoke ripping through. Great wounds erupted along Sovereign's underside, one and then another of its legs tore free, then the horrible howl of the laser fell silent.
Within that vacant aural space, Shepard realized the whine had become a piercing shrill of building feedback. "Oh crap." She grabbed Nihlus and bolted for the ramp down. "This thing is going to blow."
She didn't quite make it to the ramp before a massive hand slammed into her from behind. It threw her from the walkway, tossing her end over end to slam into the slanted walls of the canyon. Sliding upside down on her back, she careened down their length, tumbling to a rolling stop at the bottom.
"Shepard!"
She looked up at the sound of her name, wondering why Nihlus sounded so terrified. Then the entire presidium tumbled down to land on her head, and the universe went dark.
Light flashed.
Pain. Alarms of agony screamed along her entire left side.
Sweet baby Jesus, the pain. Help me. I think my arm's been ripped off. Possibly my entire side. Ummmm … help? Anyone? I need help here.
After calling out inside a strange, half-waking dream for what felt like a couple of days, Shepard began to climb out the rabbit hole, fingers scrabbling for purchase in the dirt, nails peeling back. Where were all the pianos and chandeliers, footstools and hat boxes when she needed them?
Curiouser and curiouser. Why didn't I just drink the stuff in the bottle or eat the cake? Seems the door had to be an easier way out than this. If men on the chessboard get up and tell me where to go … . No wait, that's Jefferson Airplane.
"Shepard?"
Is that Garrus screaming at me? Shhhhh … C-Sec, give the wounded woman a break.
"Shepard!" Crashing and banging pulled her further out of the fog. "I've found her."
Orange light burst like the sun on the other side of her eyelids. She winced away from it, the movement pulling a long, barbed moan of agony from her throat. A hundred varren sank their teeth in along that side, ripping and tearing as they fought over her remains.
"Shepard." Gentle talons brushed the hair from her forehead. "You okay? Can you hear me?"
She ran her tongue around the inside of her mouth, dragging it over the sandpaper and tar that clung to every surface. "I hear you," she managed to croak out, the words snapping like old twigs underfoot. "My left side hurts."
He bent down and nuzzled her brow. "Yeah, you have about a ton of rubble lying on it. Just keep still. We'll get you out."
Forcing her eyes open, she searched for him past the fiery light of his omnitool. His eyes, when she locked onto them, felt like a long, cool drink of water. "Sovereign?"
His mandibles fluttered hard. "A whole lot of pieces floating outside the Citadel. It tried to carve its way out through one of the wards, but the fleets tore it to pieces." A thumb caressed her cheek. "You did it, Kahri. You saved everyone. Not bad, even for a freakishly tiny, ornery, crazy … beautiful miracle."
She shook her head, a soft cry of pain answering even the slight movement. "No, not saved, just delayed." Her eyes drifted closed as she pressed into the comforting warmth of his hand. "Still lots of work to do, Garrus. Still so very much to do."