It was tense on the way up, no one said a word as the elevator reached the highest possible floor which opened out to large hallway, where everyone had to immediately duck back inside to the sides of the elevator due to there being a ton of snipers and Centurions. Although that problem was solved with a couple inferno grenades Shepard had. He had that explosive grin on his face as he pulled the pin and threw them inside.

The resulting explosions was quite heated to say the least, a quarter of the people in there were set on fire, none of them lived after that as they were quickly picked off. The snipers were a bit more of an issue, due to having their guns constantly pointed at the door, so if you poked your head out for more then a second your shields would be gone, then your head would be too if you were too slow.

Tom and Tali took care of this with the use of their respective powers, Tali used her combat drone to force them out of cover, and Tom would just cloak, get a head shot off with his Widow and repeat, some Centurions tried to get close, but a defense drone prevent them from getting any closer. In the end the only ones left were the Centurions, and a barrage of powers took them down, Concussive shot, disrupt, shield drain, Cryo blast, Incinerate and a handful of grenades.

"Nice job, it looks like we broke through their welcoming party." Shepard commended.

"Shepard, I think you might want to take a look at this." Tom said, he was a little bit of ahead of the group, staring at a dead body.

"Spirits" Garrus muttered as everyone saw the pile of dead C-sec and Alliance troops, in clustered pile together on the side of the hallway.

"They ambushed these guys, they probably never stood chance." Shepard said bitterly before taking the dog tags off each of the Alliance Soldiers.

"There's nothing we can do for them now, let's keep moving, the only way to honor their sacrifice is to win this war."

Meanwhile

Anderson activated the QED, hoping Hackett would respond. He did, this was good.

"Anderson, what is it? This was marked as an emergency call, what's wrong?"

"It's not about us sir, we're still getting decimated out here, it's the Reapers, Harbinger just broke off his attack and is making is way to the Mass Relay, I think he's going after the Crucible."

"Did he just break off his attack immediately?"

"He pulled a turn that could shear your ship in half and started gunning it towards a Mass Relay, that was a couple minutes ago, although it's a welcome relief that he isn't attacking us anymore, it worries me that he left with such haste since most things don't bother the Reapers."

"Thanks for the info Anderson, this is a good heads up."

XXXXXXXXXX

They walked for a bit through the Hallway, there was a lot of stairs and eventually, a lot of Cerberus, and there was a lot of dead scientists too, which disgusted Shepard. It was an uphill battle this time, the Cerberus troops had the high ground, and this would normally be an issue, but it wasn't due to their force being made up of Phantoms and Guardians, this was a blockade force, trying to make sure no one got through. The phantoms were easily taken care of after seemingly receiving an order that made all of them charge down the hill at Shepard's squad, which was completely suicidal since they're barriers may have been good, but with Shepard's orders to focus on one at a time they seemed like cardboard from combined fire.

The Guardians were a bit trickier since they actually held their positon, but with a couple more grenades, Tom flanking them, and an Attack drone, they were easily taken care of after proper plans were pulled off. This took significantly longer, but in the end Shepard did win, with minimal injuries too, he was the only that got injured by taking a shot to the gut.

"I'm fine" he said, brushing them off, he did get some Medigel on so it wasn't going to be a big deal.

It seemed Cerberus was running out of troops too since they only ran into groups of three at a time, and most of them had an attempted suicide bomber, but they were picked off by either Tom or Garrus before they could be a threat so they didn't have any problems, when they made it to the stairway that led to the controls they were a little low on thermal clips, but they were almost done, right? They could go home after this.

At the top there was one lone figure in front of the control panel that activated the Crucible, one man. The room was littered with corpses of scientists.

It was the Illusive man.

"I underestimated you, Shepard, I didn't think all of you would make it up here, but it's over now I have control." He turned around, revealing an abomination of circuitry on the left side of his face. He belonged to the Reapers now. Everyone raised their weapons, but then they all felt suddenly not in control of their own body, like it had been stolen from them.

"Why are you doing this? The war can be ended with the Crucible! Are so blind to the indoctrination that you don't even realize your stopping the people that are going to save this cycle?" Shepard said angrily.

"I can't have you do that, not after everything I've worked for, I know the Crucible will let me control the Reapers, and I intend to do that to advance Humanity to the top of the Galaxy."

"Why aren't you doing it then?! You've been sitting here this entire time and haven't even pushed the button? You're pathetic." Shepard chided.

He snapped at Shepard. "Don't lecture me on why I haven't! I've been...thinking about how to work this out, you're complicating the matter." He said.

"It's no use, they own you now, as soon as you had that Reaper tech implanted in your face they've owned your every thought, you just don't know it." Tom said.

"No one's telling me what to do! I'm in control here!" He shouted, but he was getting more concerned with every single word that came at him.

"Then activate the Crucible, you bosh'tet! We're waiting!" Tali said.

He looked like he was about to to, turning to face the console, but then he turned back around. "I'm sorry, I just can't do that."

"It's just like Tom said, they control you now, even though you're so blind you don't even realize it, you can help us win, just let go of us for a second." Shepard pleaded, letting The Illusive man have a chance at redemption.

"I-I I'm sorry Shepard, I tried to fight it but after a while it controlled me too, I can't do this, they demand that I kill you, but I won't. I was a fool to think I could control them, and now I need to stop you from getting to the control panel, but I won't." He took the pistol and almost pulled the trigger on his own head when a voice Shepard knew very well boomed throughout the room.

"That won't be necessary, assuming direct control."

"What? No!" The Illusive man screamed as his entire body and mind was overpowered by the Reaper, Jack Harper now no longer existed, Harbinger had destroyed the little bit of him that was still there after the indoctrination.

"Harbinger." Shepard's voice held enough venom in it to kill a man. "Light him up!" He ordered before pulling out his Revenant and going to town on the Reaper. His barrier however was incredibly strong and took all the damage from the two snipers, shotgun user and one assault rifle user with barely any issue, then he struck back with a black ball of pure energy.

It slammed into Shepard, which disabled his shields and set him on fire a little bit, but Shepard just grit his teeth and kept firing. That's when Tom decided to act, since all of Harbinger's attention was focused on Shepard he snuck up behind the Reaper and used his Omni-choke, which effective stopped the entire fight for ten seconds.

It almost seemed too easy until his Omni-tool exploded from the unstable energy it absorbed, his shields took the brute of the explosion, but it had enough concussive force to slam him into a wall at the far side of the room, he felt at least one rib broken as well, which was not good.

"Error 351 Overload detected, rebooting memory, standby." His Omni-tool said as it tried to fix itself from the explosion that somehow didn't incinerate the whole dang thing, he could barely move anyway, his vision was blurred and it hurt to move all over.

This was actually a losing fight for Shepard, Harbinger's barrier was way stronger then it was before, and his energy attacks were hard to avoid and did massive damage if the Reaper landed a successful attack, his barriers almost flat out ignored bullet damage entirely, but they were wearing it down, slowly.

The issue was that there was no cover in the room so your shields wouldn't recharge unless he started attacking someone else for a while, and Tali's drone was a pretty decent distraction. It didn't last however, because soon Harbinger walked right up to Tali and swatted her aside like a fly that had actually started to be annoying, she was slammed against the wall, probably unconscious. Even though Garrus and Shepard were combining fire to take this monstrosity down it wasn't enough, his shields were down to 10% but that was going down slower as two people were already out of action, Shepard still didn't know if Tom was even alive at this point.

8%, 7%, 6%, and that's when Garrus got hit with a ball of black energy while his shield was recharging, which tossed him across the room like a rag doll. Shepard quickly ran over and administered the only two stocks of Medi-gel to Garrus and Tali, hoping that it would keep them alive before he continued shooting Harbinger. He used up his remaining supply of Medi-gel on Tali, there was none left for Tom.

5%, 4%, 3%, he dodged a black energy bolt meant for him before he continued shooting. 2% 1% 0%...and that's when everything went to hell. Right after his barrier went down Harbinger walked straight up to Shepard, punched the Commander with enough force to make him see stars and held him up by his neck.

"Reboot complete." Tom's Omni-tool blinked back into life and then Section quickly administered the remaining amount of synthetic adrenaline that he had into Tom's system. He woke up right there.

"Gah, thank the lord Section, we all would've died here would it not be for you."

"I'm administering the remaining Medi-gel."

"Hold that, I might need it for someone else right now." Tom said as he cloaked and got up.

"I said I would tear you apart Shepard, and I will."

"For all your apparent wisdom and power, you should have never forgotten I had friends." Shepard sputtered as Harbinger's back was lit up by a Claymore Heavy Shotgun that Tali had been using before she was knocked out, Tom had taken it. Tom reloaded, then shot again, and then he did it again, Harbinger was barely standing at this point, so he dropped Shepard and spun around, only to receive a shotgun blast to the face for his effort.

After all of this, Harbinger finally knew what it was like to be torn apart as his body was nothing but a mangled corpse after the third shotgun blast to the face. Tom turned around, looking at the carnage that had happened in the room, and he noticed Shepard, on the floor with several wounds, he walked over.

"I got you Shepard, now let's end this war." Tom said as he helped Shepard up.

"Thanks Tom, you saved my life here, now let's get this thing ready and destroy the Reapers once and for all." He limped over to the console and uploaded the code, it was all gibberish before, but now it actually readable words on it. It had one option on it.

Destroy

"Looks like it's game over for the Reapers." Tom said as he looked over Shepard's shoulder. As soon as the Commander clicked on it there was more information given.

Destroy the central intelligence of the Reapers and render each Reaper non-functional, there will be no collateral damage and the only things destroyed will be the Reapers and any of those using Reaper tech, this will effectively end the Galactic extinction cycle that happens every 50,000 years. All indoctrination will be destroyed and all symptoms will be removed. This leaves all Reaper databases intact but the Reapers themselves will be permanently deactivated.

"About time this is all ending, I'm doing it." Shepard had said as he pressed the button.

"Shepard to shield fleet, the Reapers are about to go offline, this attack will only destroy the Reapers and will render them permanently deactivated, there will be no collateral damage. Hold out against Harbinger a little longer, the Crucible is about to finish powering up."

"Thank you Shepard, we all owe you our lives, we'll hold out until it goes off." Hackett said.

It was not long before the Crucible fired, bathing everything in a light of pure white, Harbinger seemed unmoved at first, but afterward the machine promptly deactivated as its 'eyes' blinked out of existence. After the pulse bathed the system the Crucible shot out a beam to the Relay in the system which caused the Relay's eezo core to turn white as it's rings rapidly started accelerating. And then it shot out a bright white beam into the distance before the rings stopped accelerating rapidly and then eventually turned back to normal speed, the Relay itself remained white.

All over the Galaxy this happened as a chain reaction destroyed the Reapers, instantly destroying the cycle that had gone on for so long. The war was finally over, and the entire Galaxy was glad it was over.

"I'm calling for evac, we all need some serious Medical help." Shepard said before getting on his Omni-tool.

"Joker we need immediate evac, we're all wounded down here and if we wait too much longer we'll begin to bleed out, I'm activating my emergency transponder so that you can hone in on my position."

"You got it Shepard, I'll have Kaiden and the rest of them come and get you, and then I'll send Cortez, is the war over?"

"Yeah it is, I've had enough, Shepard out." He sighed and sat down, leaning against the console.

"You alright?" Tom asked.

"Yeah, I just don't feel right inside, I feel like I'm about to throw up."

"I hear you, take the remaining amount of Medi-Gel I have, it'll keep you alive until our friends show up."

"Thanks Tom, I owe a lot to you."

"We're in this fight together, and you deserve it after all of the stuff you've done for us."

...

Shepard wasn't more glad to stay in bed this time. He was back in the Normandy's Medbay where he was recovering from several broken ribs and a couple burns, most of them were 2nd degree.

"We'll get you to a proper hospital soon Shepard, for now I'll do what I can." Chakwas said as she applied a light antiseptic to the burns he had.

"Is the war over? I was busy in here when the pulse went off."

"It's over, the Crucible ended it with a big white wave, now I can finally sit down without having to worry about someone asking me to shoot up a couple Reapers or to forge an impossible alliance."

"You've done more then enough for this Galaxy. I believe now you can rest and have a bit more time for yourself, God forbid you deserve it."

"You said it, I think I'm going to rest now." The Commander smiled. It was finally over, the threat he'd been fighting for what felt like decades had finally been destroyed, and now he could rest easy knowing that the Galaxy was now safe.

Kaiden Alenko remained a Spectre throughout his life and proved very effective at dealing with post war issues, he retired after 20 years as one of the most decorated Spectres in the History of the Citadel. He lived in a small house in Vancouver for the rest of his life.

Tali Zorah was known as a hero throughout her people and worked tirelessly after the war to ensure peace between the Geth and the Quarians, citing that she wanted to honor the alliance Shepard had made between them. The relationship between Tom and her never blossomed completely, but they still took comfort in each other from time to time.

Garrus Vakarian eventually became a hero on Palaven after his service to Commander Shepard became public knowledge, he eventually became the Primarch. There was a statue built of him in Palaven's capital city. He retired 15 years after being Primarch and retired in the same house that his family had lived in for generations.

Liara T'soni continued her duty as the Shadow broker for centuries, using it for good instead of evil while still maintaining the reputation of the Shadow broker, she eventually gave the network to her daughter after 800 years in the business. She made sure that Shepard's sacrifice was always honored in her work.

James Vega was promoted to Commander and saw a great many years of service and was eventually promoted to the Rank of Admiral, and was respected about as much as Admiral Hackett due to his service with Shepard. He retired later after 25 years in the service.

Steven Hackett retired 3 years after the end of the Reaper war, he died of old age and was give a Military burial with full honors, the Funeral had over ten thousand people attending including Shepard and several other war veterans.

Jeff Moreau retired soon after the Reaper war where he lived on the Citadel for 30 years. His condition was eventually treated due to amazing advances in medicine after the databases of the Reapers were found, he lived with EDI until he died and although he never had a true marriage, citing he felt it would be awkward to have one, he still had a loving relationship with her.

EDI stood by Jeff Moreau until he died, and continued to serve in the Alliance for many years afterwards, and although she as never really recognized as a member of the Alliance she was treated as one. She served on many ships throughout her service.

Karin Chakwas opened up a private Medical Clinic on Earth where she worked for years until she retired, every Alliance officer was given free treatment. She never married and died peacefully in her sleep one morning.

Samara died fighting off 5 banshees at once to buy time for several shuttles full of Civilians to escape. There was a statue made in her honor in the same city where she died fighting.

David Anderson was heralded as a hero throughout the Alliance after the Reaper war, there was a statue put up in London in his honor. He retired following the Reaper war along with Commander Shepard. He had two children with Kahlee Sanders and lived a full life after the end of the war.

Jack continued teaching in the Academy following the Reaper war, where she was eventually promoted to the headmaster after years of work and never retired, citing that she'd teach until she's drop. She died in the middle of speech and was buried by her students in the Academy, she was known as a Legendary teacher throughout the history of the Academy following her death.

Jacob Taylor had 4 children, one of them was named Shepard since his wife insisted, he came back into the Alliance for a while after the Reaper war and retired as a Captain 10 years later to take care of his kids.

Urdnot Wrex soon became the Counciler for the Krogan and represented them well for centuries, Eve was always there to keep him level headed and he kept good control over the Krogan for a long time.

Miranda Lawson married Shepard after the Reaper war, they lived happily in Vancover in wealth and luxury due to the immense wealth her father had. She helped dig up the remaining Cerberus locations after the war ended which the Alliance promptly investigated.

John Shepard was heralded as a hero throughout the Galaxy, there were statues all over the Galaxy to commend him on his amazing service during the Reaper war, he had two children with Miranda and lived in America until he died. He lived off of Miranda's immense wealth and the royalties of the vids, he died with a smile on his face one morning. Over 1,000,000,000,000,000,000 people watched as he was buried at his funeral and the entire Galaxy mourned his death. He was known as a legend for centuries after his death.

Tom Fisher became a white hat hacker for the Alliance and helped to make amazing addition security measures against hackers for the Alliance. He made a lot of money and retired after 20 years in a modest house near his original birth place in Manitoba. His secret of being from the past died with him and no one besides Tali and Garrus ever found out.

A/N: So that's it then, Shepard finally got the happy ending he deserved and Tom was successful in preventing the Reapers from giving Shepard a sacrificial victory where he died. I never thought I'd make it this far, I just thought my story would just died, but you guys kept it going, thank you for all the support, it's been a long ride and I certainly enjoyed it. I will no longer be responding to reviews besides send you a PM, thanks again for all the support. This is the end.

Reviews:

general-joseph-dickson: I hope this chapter brought as much enjoyment as the previous one..