Author's Note: Welcome to the third chapter of my fan fiction. I hope you have enjoyed everything so far. I know the first two chapters are a little depressing. This chapter is where things start to change a little bit and some liberties may have been taken when it comes to the Mass Effect Universe, you can be the judge. But I have some reasoning behind it. Also this is where my two original characters come in, one is very vocal and the other is just me planting seeds for when he is formally introduced in a later chapter. And finally, I reveal why this story is called Mass Effect: Shepard's Purpose. So enjoy.

Chapter 3 – The Man in the White Abyss

Shepard opened his eyes to find himself in a white abyss. "Glad you could join me again, Shepard." A voice said.

Shepard found the white abyss had some type of surface to it so he stood up. He looked around for the origins of the voice and found a man seated in a white armchair. The man was not familiar to Shepard but wore a black suit with a black tie and had a drink in his hand which he swirled. "Who are you? What am I doing here? How…"

The man cut him off. "So many questions, Shepard. But I will answer them in the order I see fit. First, where are you? Well, you are in an area between life and death. Most never come here they just die but some just need a little more time."

"So I am dead?"

"Yes and no. You died after Harbinger tried to indoctrinate you. You were able to fight it off but your mind was not strong enough to come back. So here we are."

"So everything that happened in the Citadel was indoctrination? What about the Reapers? What about my friends that crashed on some jungle planet? What about the mass re…."

Again the man cut off Shepard. "I am getting to all that. First, the Reapers, they have been destroyed after the crucible was set off. However, all AIs were essential destroyed as well. So your friend Joker is kind of a mess having lost EDI and Captain Anderson died trying to get to the conduit. Other than that your friends are safe on Earth just mourning the loss of you."

Sadness consumed Shepard as he thought of how devastated Tali must be. The man continued. "The mass relays are all but fine. They did deactivate for a short time as they transported the red energy from system to system to destroy the reapers. So what is the next question. Ah yes who am I. Well, that is a tough question as I really have no name because a name means someone previously named me. The fact is I have been and always will be."

"So you are God?"

"To many, I can be considered God but I am not omnipotent as many cultures have made their Gods out to be. I am a creator and a passive observer."

"You watched everything that unfolded and you did nothing to help."

"No, Shepard. Like I said I am not omnipotent. All I can do is communicate with other beings to have them intervene when I feel it is warranted. You being one of them."

"What do you mean?'

"Well, you don't remember the last time you died we had a conversation about the Reapers and I told you I believe your purpose in life would be to stop the Reapers. And you have fulfilled your purpose so you can now move on."

"Why did you want the Reapers destroyed so badly?"

"I enjoy observing life especially as it evolves. Diversity makes for interesting observations. The Reapers disturbed this by becoming a reset button, of sorts, but I couldn't do anything to stop them."

"All reapers wanted to do was to restart evolution? I thought they were trying to stop synthetics ftom exterminating all organic life."

"That was a bunch of indoctrinated bullshit. A mind like yours may not understand completely so I can only sum it up for you in this way. The Reapers felt if they fulfilled their purpose they would become obsolete and like any beings they fought for self preservation in turn bringing about a new purpose. That being harvesting or destroying all evolved life."

Shepard digest the information as a silence came over the abyss. "So what now?"

"Good question, Shepard. This is why I love talking to you but your journey is at an end. You can just move on."

"Wait minute. You are asking me to officially die. Your making it seem like I have a choice in the matter?"

"Well, you do, Shepard. However, going back will leave you without a purpose and it won't be all rainbows and ponies. You will have to deal with the aftereffects of indoctrination so you'll never be happy. Plus you will never have a family as you love a Quarian and the two of you cannot procreate thus you won't even have a purpose of being someone's true father. So I say you can stick around with me for awhile and we can chat and then you can go off to death." The man raised his glass to this then took a sip.

"I can't just leave my team behind though."

"Of course you can. The indoctrination aftereffects will hurt all your relationships possibly shatter them. Then what will you have, nothing and you will come back here miserable. It is better if you just go out being somewhat happy don't ya think?"

"No." Shepard turned on his heels and walked away from the man.

"So Shepard you don't want to believe in an absolute. That is fine but I want you to remember this Shepard the difference between organics and synthetics is a synthetic believes in the existence of 100% or absolutes. Where organics believe in that 0.1% of the time anything is possible. This is where hope comes from. This why you are going back because you believe you are that 0.1% but I know you will become that 99.9%. You have been warned."

Soldiers walked on the rubble that was once a London street. The street was where Hammer team had been decimated. Now, soldiers were there to gather bodies. Petty Officer Jerma Jones scanned the area and saw movement. He pulled out his two pistols he holstered on his hips and approached with caution. There he found a badly burnt body wearing N7 tags struggling to breath. He turned to his squad and yelled. "Lieutenant, I think I have a live one here."