Invictus

II: Fortuna

An all-encompassing sense of peace was a nice feeling to have, and it was a feeling that Commander Riva Shepard seldom woke up to. But as her mind slowly crawled from the void of unconsciousness, it was the first feeling it found and, as such, was the feeling it doggedly latched onto. As her mind pulled itself from the void, sense of peace in hand, it found more and more sensations to collect: warmth, softness, quiet...All feelings that had been far too infrequent in her life, all feelings that had been previously overshadowed by other more pressing matters. Her mind slowly meandered through this comforting fog, and whether she spent minutes or years gently holding onto these feelings, it felt as though it didn't matter. Because she had done it.

She had done it.

And with that, the magic was broken.

Her mind kicked into gear as the comforting fog dissipated, replaced by a gradual, creeping awareness of her body — from the warmth came the sensation of sheets on her skin, and from the quiet, a rhythmic whirring drifting into her ears. The whirring rhythm acted as a metronome, keeping her mind from slipping back into the void as it struggled to recall what, exactly, had happened between now and —

And —

The Reapers.

She had...shot at something. And there had been explosions...and pain. And some child who had said things that she remembers were absurd and made little sense.

How had she lived through those explosions? Through whatever choice that child had given her?

She tried to open her eyes, and found that her body wasn't quite ready to move. Or, perhaps, it had forgotten that it had the means. She tried once more, and found again that her eyelids refused to budge. The rhythm of the whirs kept her anchored as she summoned the strength to do the one little thing; surely Commander Shepard, who had managed to do a little thing like uniting the entire galaxy against an enemy with overwhelming power, could open her eyes. But after what felt like hours and hours of trying, the whirring eventually stopped, leaving only a vague feeling in what may have been her arm and the silence that filled her ears.

The whirring had been comforting in a way, and as though to pursue the whirring — to find out where it was going and why it was leaving — her body managed to crack an eyelid open. Her vision was poor: everything was blurry and indistinct, and it took incredible effort to keep her eyes open. But she saw a blob receding into the dim distance, and it was enough to entice her into closing her eyes and trying again. Still blurry, but more in her periphery. Again and again she tried, each time her vision growing slightly better, until finally her eyes reconciled the blobs and shapes of her surroundings into a more recognizable form.

It was a dimmed hospital room, and if her currently sluggish brain was recalling details correctly, it looked quite like a room in Huerta Memorial on the Citadel. She glanced to her left and found what was likely the source of the prior whirring sound. And to her right was —

A chair, pushed under a bare table.

Not a soul in sight.

A leaden weight seemed to sink into the very pit of Shepard's stomach. If there was no sign of anyone around, did that mean that they — did that mean that something happened during — ? Did that mean that Garrus was hurt? Or — or worse?

She pushed the thought aside, unable to bear thinking about it. Perhaps she'd...perhaps she'd been whisked away by some radical organization again, expecting her to do their bidding. Yes, perhaps that was it — despite the overwhelming evidence that she was, in fact, in Huerta Memorial (whose name she could now see in bold lettering on the wall to her right).

That had to be it.

The thought of anything else just —

It just —

Her mind began drifting off, the thoughts too heavy to sustain further consciousness. And with her mind went her vision, and soon Commander Shepard drifted off into an uneasy sleep.

The next time Shepard awoke felt much more natural. Her body seemed to finally remember its functions, allowing her to slowly open her eyes to the brighter light that had drawn her into consciousness in the first place. Unfortunately, in remembering those bodily functions, it managed to remember how to be in pain as well. Amid the unpleasant grogginess that was weighing down her head, there was a vague pain that seemed to ripple out from any limb she tried to move and a sharp, throbbing ache in her face, particularly around her eyes. It was not nearly as pleasant as the nice, soft fog from earlier, and she found herself wishing she could go back to that blissfully painless state.

"Shepard?"

The sound of a word — of her name — briefly threw her mind into chaos, and it felt as though her eyes flitted about the room in every direction until finally settling on the direction of the sound's actual location. There, her eyes found a blue-skinned something sitting in the chair which lifted the unpleasant weight in her stomach considerably.

"L-Liara?" Shepard attempted to croak — the actual croak that escaped her throat could hardly be called a word.

"Shepard, I'm — I'm glad you're awake," said an unscathed Liara, her voice calm but her face betraying a sort of intense relief. It was the kind of face that made Shepard wonder just where on the spectrum of not dead to deader than dead she had been in the time before she regained consciousness. She opened her mouth to attempt speaking again but realized that it would produce the same result as last time; fortunately, Liara was quick on the uptake and offered her a cup of ice chips.

"Here, suck on some ice," she said, bringing the cup to Shepard's lips. Grateful for any form of moisture she could get, Shepard tried to lift a hand to take the cup but found that she likely wouldn't have been able to hold anything with it anyways and instead allowed Liara to shake an ice chip from the cup and into her mouth. The coldness of the ice and the subsequent moisture from the melting water did wonders, and within a minute or so, she felt ready to try speaking again.

"Liara," said Shepard hesitantly. Her voice was raspy and her throat still felt dry, but she managed to say it nonetheless. So she said it once more, this time with more confidence: "Liara."

The sound of her name seemed to relieve Liara greatly — her shoulders relaxed, and she seemed to silently let out the air she'd been holding in. "Shepard, how do you feel?" she asked.

"Like shit," was the only way Shepard could sum up her feelings at this time. Liara gave a small laugh.

"That's — to be expected."

"Are you hurt at all?"

There was something odd about how that question seemed to take Liara by surprise. "I'm fine," she finally managed to say. And, in an obvious attempt to cut off questions, she offered another ice chip and asked, "So what can you remember from before you woke up?"

Shepard thought for a moment, rolling the ice around her mouth. "I was in the Crucible, and there was this kid there," she said, her brow furrowed in concentration. "He said some things — and I shot at something — and there were explosions. That's — that's all I can remember."

"There was...a child?" said Liara incredulously.

"Yeah, he looked — almost like a VI? AI? Said some things...Didn't make any sense. Why would they — why would destroying — I — sorry, I can't remember..."

"It's okay, Shepard. No need to push yourself now," Liara said with a small smile.

"Liara, where's Garrus?"

The way Liara tensed up was definitely not a good sign. "Is Garrus okay?" said Shepard, putting a hand on the bed railing and struggling to sit up. "Is he hurt? Where is he?"

"He's fine, he's fine," Liara said, putting a hand on Shepard's shoulder and gently pushing her back down and giving Shepard some attempt at a reassuring smile — but all Shepard could see was the hesitation and unease in her eyes. "He's — on Palaven right now."

On Palaven?

Something in her seemed to fracture. A selfish thought briefly crossed her mind: If he was fine, why wasn't he the one to greet her as she woke?

"H-how long was I out?" Shepard asked slowly, letting her hand slip from the bed railing.

"Quite a while, so don't try to push yourself too hard."

Bit of a non-answer.

"Liara, how long was I out?" she ventured again.

"You've just woken up, it's important not to —"

"Liara!"

Liara fell silent, just barely flinching at Shepard's voice. Shepard took a deep breath.

"Liara. How long was I asleep?"

It was Liara's turn to take a deep breath. Shepard mentally steeled herself. Would it be two years again? Four?

"Twenty-seven years."

Shepard blinked.

"I'm sorry. What?"

The calm, demure Liara that had been there seemed to be suddenly replaced by the young Liara that Shepard had rescued on Therum.

"T-twenty-seven years. Twenty-seven, Shepard."

Surely she wasn't hearing properly.

"What?"

Liara looked uncomfortable, her face a mixture of pity and...guilt, perhaps? "Twenty-seven years," she said again, softly this time.

With that face — no, there was no way she was lying. And Liara wasn't one to joke around.

"But — twenty-seven — ? How — why — ?" Words tumbled out of Shepard's mouth almost at random. Her mind was losing its grip, it was slipping, losing control in the torrent of jumbled thoughts racing through it. Twenty-seven years. How was this possible? Who had done this? Why? For what reason? Por qué? Pour quoi?

She hadn't even realized that words had stopped coming out of her mouth — she was staring blankly at the ceiling, mouth slightly agape. A heavy feeling was weighing down her entire body, as a constant stream of why, why, why this, why me, why again filled her thoughts. Wasn't it enough that she had given her entire being not once but twice to suicide missions? She had given her entire being to the whole galaxy, she had given everything she had and more...So why now? What insurmountable obstacle existed that needed Commander Shepard specifically, twenty-seven years later, to conquer it?

"Why…?" was all Shepard could eke from her tightening throat, turning her bleary eyes toward Liara.

"We're still trying to figure that out," Liara said softly. "The quarians found you in a stasis pod in the Perseus Veil in an unmarked frigate. There weren't many people inside, most looked like scientists and engineers, all of them dead...They tried to leave a message, but it's quite corrupted. I have some of my agents working to restore the data. They should be finished soon."

Shepard simply made a sound to acknowledge her words before turning her eyes back to the ceiling. Twenty-seven years. So that was why nobody had been waiting for her to wake up. So that was why Garrus was on Palaven and not here. She'd been dead to them. They'd moved on. She had been in limbo for twenty-seven years. Twenty-seven.

Her heart felt as though it had been cleaved in half. There was no Shepard without Vakarian. No Shepard without Vakarian.

No Shepard without Vakarian.

But Vakarian — her Vakarian — her one turian — hadn't had a Shepard in twenty-seven years.

And now here she was.

She couldn't even begin to imagine how painful it must have been for him. And even though everything in her wanted to see Garrus, wanted to see him and hold him and kiss the scars on his face…

Her gut churned.

It was all wrong. Everything was wrong. She wasn't the type to feel sorry for herself, she wasn't the type to be suicidal, despite everything she had been through that could suggest the contrary. But now, after everything…

...Wouldn't it have been better if she'd just died? Again? For good this time?

"Shepard?" came Liara's voice softly. Shepard blinked and slowly turned her eyes to her. "Would you — prefer that I leave you alone? I can return later…"

"N-no, stay," said Shepard, her voice strangled. "Please."

"Of course."

Shepard wasn't sure how long they remained in silence, but she was glad for Liara's presence. After twenty-seven years, her friends — at least, the ones who remained — would probably be weathered by time, but Liara looked the same as ever. And seeing that sameness, seeing the same Liara that had been her friend, was all that was grounding Shepard and keeping her mind from careening into a dark abyss.

The silence had been so heavy that Shepard jumped slightly at the sound of the door sliding open. An unfamiliar human stepped in, very obviously a doctor and with a datapad in hand. "Good evening, Commander Shepard," he said congenially as he approached the bed, though he had quite the nervous smile on his face. "I'm Dr. Plunkett. How do you feel?"

Quite honestly, she felt like disappearing into the depths of nothingness. "Awful," was the more practical response.

Plunkett seemed wholly unsurprised and nodded as he held his omni-tool over her. "Vitals are looking good," he said, tapping something into his datapad. "Now, do you mind if we check how your arms and legs are doing?"

Whether Shepard minded or not didn't matter, as Plunkett pulled the sheets away without waiting for an answer. From there, he started on a battery of tests to verify the extent of her body's motor function. Fortunately, he was no-nonsense and wasn't one for idle chit-chat while working and it seemed like only a few minutes had passed before he was finished poking and prodding at her arms and legs.

"Everything seems in order, Commander," said Plunkett, tapping away on his datapad. "We were worried that the state of the stasis pod may have caused some lasting damage. I'll send nurses in to check your mobility a little bit later. One or two visitors in the room at most. No krogan. At least for another day." He gave Shepard a small smile before nodding to Liara and taking his leave.

Silence descended upon the room once more. Shepard has so many questions racing through her mind that she wanted to ask (although she wasn't sure if she wanted to know the answers). One, however, stuck out the most in the sea of thoughts.

"Was it hard?" Shepard asked. "To pick up the pieces? After the Crucible fired?"

Liara took a moment to consider the question, before bowing her head slightly. "I suppose it was," she said, letting out a small sigh. "When the Crucible activated, it sent a sort of energy pulse through the mass relays. It destroyed the Reapers, but severely damaged our technology and infrastructure, including the relays. And E—" But she suddenly paused, and it was obvious on her face that she was reconsidering her words. "The Citadel was heavily damaged as well, and without the relays...In the end, Earth and the Alliance managed to support half the galaxy long enough for the relays to be repaired."

She paused for a moment, head bowed again. "In a way, having so much to rebuild helped keep me — helped keep people — sane. It was hard, thinking about all the...all the loved ones we lost," Liara said softly, eyes carefully averted from Shepard.

"I — I'm sorry," said Shepard. Objectively, she knew that if she hadn't made a choice — if she hadn't done what she did — neither of them would be in that room right now, but knowing just what her actions had cost…

"No, you're the last person who should be sorry," Liara said, her voice a mixture of surprise and indignation. "Things were hard, but I would endure them a thousand times over if it meant defeating the Reapers. Fortunately, one time was enough."

The smile on Liara's face was so genuine, so sincere, that Shepard couldn't help but turn the corners of her mouth up in as much of a smile as she could muster.

"I know it's been, well, twenty-seven years, but you should probably get some rest, Shepard," said Liara.

Shepard considered this a moment, but the idea of sleeping filled her with a sense of dread — she'd spent twenty-seven years drifting alone in a limbo between life and death, and had the fortune of finding out that she'd been preserved for reasons unknown. She couldn't help having the tiny fear that, should she dare close her eyes again, she'd wake to find herself alone.

Liara smiled reassuringly, as though sensing Shepard's reluctance.

"Get some rest. I'll be here."

A/N: Wrote some things during the downtime at work. Not very good, but I hope it's entertaining. It's going pretty slow...Maybe I'll have more time to get to the real action soon.