3. Shadows and Ghosts

Commander Shepard stands under a familiar gray sky in a dark, cold park. Black wispy shadows move around her as whispers and strange sounds fill the air. She can't make them out and tries to push murmurs out of her mind. Instead she searches through the trees and fog, beyond a murky mass of forms, until she sees him. The human child. The one from the Alliance HQ on Earth. The one she couldn't save. He's here now sitting on a bench, a golden light illuminating his small frame in the darkness. He's here. This time could be different.

She moves toward the boy as the strange feeling of urgency and importance spreads throughout her mind. He stands and runs further, beyond another group of inky figures and crouches on the ground, hands covering his ears. Shepard moves again towards the child.

"Hello, Commander Shepard." It's a woman's voice behind her. She knows this voice. Captain Hannah Shepard, her mother. She stops.

"What are you doing here?" She asks, not yet taking her eyes away from the child. This shouldn't be happening... She shouldn't be here. The Commander's own thoughts are confusing even to her, but some part of her mind pulls a memory through the gray fog.

"I wanted to see you and to make sure you were ok," her mother responds.

"I'm fine. You didn't have to come," she says. The words seem to spill from her mouth. I remember this. The conversation we had when she came to see me while I was in Alliance custody. Two weeks after destroying the Alpha Relay... and all of the Bahak System.

"Come on. This is your mother you're talking to. That line doesn't work on me," Hannah tells her.

Shepard continues to look at the child as her mother speaks to her. There is an anxiety welling up inside of her and it keeps her focus on him. "I'm sorry, mom. But you shouldn't have come." I need to move. I can save him this time. I have to get to him before-

"No. Listen to me." Hannah pulls Shepard's arm and turns her away from the boy. "You need to stop this. Right now. I came all this way to see my daughter and I'm not leaving until you talk to me."

Shepard recognizes this. The words, the commanding tone, the Alliance uniform her mother wears in front of her now, it all comes back to her. It makes her feel uneasy to have this moment replay here. It isn't the time. She needs to reach the boy, yet the words continue to flow even as her thoughts are on the child in the distance behind her.

"I had no idea what I was really walking into," she says to her mother just as she had back on Earth. "It was supposed to be an extraction assignment. But it turned out to be tied directly to the reaper invasion. The relay... I tried to send out a warning to evacuate the system but it was too late. And all those people..."

"Stop. Right now," Hannah demands in that commanding tone she'd perfected from a lifetime in the Alliance. "No more of this. You did what you had to do. I know you tried your best to warn the batarians. Everyone knows that."

"Do they? I saw the vids and the reports from the batarian officials saying this had nothing to do with reapers," Commander Shepard feels the exasperation just as she had on that day. "They're saying this is based on humanity's vendetta against the batarians and that I did this to repay them for their part in Blitz. That the Alliance got their damn war hero to put the final nail in the coffin!"

Shepard exhales sharply. This memory is overwhelming. She doesn't want to relive this. Once was enough. The hurt and anger, the feelings of failure, guilt and frustration take her over just as they had that day and she hates it.

She remembers the look on the Alliance committee members' faces when she and Anderson tried to convince them the reaper threat was still eminent. Anderson even gave up his seat on the Citadel Council to stand by her side after she turned herself in to the Alliance. But the officials didn't want to believe. They didn't want to see the truth. Shepard and Anderson couldn't make them acknowledge what was happening even with all the proof, the dozens of reports and eye-witness testimonies. They hadn't been there. Not on Ilos. Not fighting Sovereign. Not stoping the collectors.

"I lost two years. Two years!" Shepard's frustration overwhelms her and tears begin to form in her eyes, just as they had that day in her quarters in Vancouver. "When Cerberus brought me back, I saw that nothing had changed. No one wanted to understand that the reapers never went away. All it did was buy them some time when we stopped Sovereign. And what did they do? Tried to pretend it was over. That it was just a rouge spectre... chasing ghosts."

Just a rouge spectre chasing ghosts. The words echo softly in her head and she glances at the boy behind her. He is standing there in the distance. Just looking at her. Expecting her to come to him. She starts to turn her body towards the child, but her mother stops her.

"The people that matter never doubted you. Never. I'm more proud of you now than I've ever been," Hannah says to her.

Shepard knows what her mother will say next and her heart clenches in her chest. She realizes just how much she needs to hear those words again.

"It takes so much more courage to stand up for what you know is right when everyone else is content to be blind to the truth," her mother says to her, pride shining through her eyes. "You stood in front of the Alliance Council, told them exactly what happened and exactly why the galaxy is still in danger. And just because they don't understand, don't assume that no one else does. Believe me. You have a lot of supporters regardless of the committee's poor judgement."

Commander Shepard closes her eyes tightly for a moment as she braces herself for the next part.

"Your father would be so proud of you." Her mother's eyes begin to fill with tears now. There have been only three times in her life she's seen her mother cry. This memory was one of them. The first was when her father died. He was killed while on assignment to shutdown a red sand operation in Outer-Council space. The second was when she died. Shepard watched the vids of her own memorial after Cerberus brought her back from death. Hannah, dressed in formal Alliance uniform, sat next to Anderson and Hackett during the service. She kept her chin up high and her shoulders straight but the tears were there.

The older woman takes a deep breath before continuing. "Speaking of which, I brought you a little something." She pulls out a small case from her jacket pocket and hands it to her daughter.

"What is it?" Shepard asks looking at her mother even though she knows exactly what the small container held. She opens it to reveal a small platinum heart-shaped locket. A match for the one she lost during the Skyllian Blitz. The one her father gave her when she graduated from the academy.

"I had it remade at the same place your dad and I got the original from."

"How did you know?" Shepard touches the metal, remembering the day they gave her the locket. They were so proud of her they'd said. She put their photos into the locket the next day and it was her most prized possession. Even though she couldn't wear it while on duty, Shepard kept it in her locker or pack wherever she was assigned. She'd been on shore leave on Elysium when the pirates began their attack on the colony. In all the chaos, she lost the necklace.

Her mother smiles at her before answering. "Garrus Vakarian. He contacted me a week ago and asked me to make sure you were ok. He also sent over a datapad for you. I left it with Lieutenant Vega. He agreed to sneak it over to you once his shift starts."

"So he told you about the necklace?" Shepard asks still looking at the small locket, a smile on her face at the mention of Garrus.

"He said you told him the story after the Alpha Relay incident and that it was something you've been carrying around with you all this time. That you're somehow afraid I would be mad at you or think less of you for losing the necklace while you were busy saving an entire damn colony." Her mother shakes her head in disbelief at the thought, then reaches out to brush a strand of hair from Shepard's face. "Why didn't you tell me before? And more importantly, why have you been carrying this grief over it all these years?"

"I was ashamed I guess," Shepard confesses, looking up at her mother. "I even tried going to look for it after getting out of med-bay, but I couldn't find it. I just thought you'd be disappointed. But mostly I was mad at myself for not keeping it close to me. I guess I just felt that losing it was like losing a part of dad."

Her mother sighs and shakes her head. "It's just a trinket. This can always be replaced. It's the memory that you hold on to. Not only did you survive that attack, but you saved a lot of lives on Elysium that day. Trust me. There is no way your father and I could have been disappointed about any of it."

Hannah smiles warmly at Shepard before she turns and starts to walk away.

"Wait. Where are you going?" Shepard asks. She's confused. This isn't how it should end. On Earth, they'd kept talking for a while longer about the ship her mother was stationed on, about Garrus, about the Normandy and how Joker was hanging on to the mementos she'd left in her cabin. But instead, she's leaving.

Shepard watches as her mother turns to give a short wave before fading into the passing mass of shadowy forms. The locket in the Commander's hand also dissipates in to dark mist. She looks around, for her mother, for the child, for anyone.

She sees the boy again, standing next to a tree. The gold light continuing to glow around him and the previous urgency she felt before begins to creep in.

"Hey Commander." Another voice calls out to her and Shepard immediately turns towards it and away from the boy. "Got a minute?"

"Ash?" Shepard sees her former Gunnery Chief Ashley Williams step out from the shadows, wearing her red and white armor.

"I know we don't have a lot of time."

"Ash, wait. I wanted to tell you that I'm sorry," Shepard interrupts her, not wanting to miss this chance to say to Ashley things that she'd repeated in her head over and over since Virmire. "I never expected that I'd have to leave one of my teammates behind. Even when Saren showed up, I still thought I'd be able to get to you in time."

"Commander, saving the LT on Virmire was the right choice," Ashely replies confidently. "The fight, the sacrifice. This is what we sign up for. You guys stopped Saren and destroyed Sovereign. You made what happened on Virmire mean something. You got the job done, Shepard. And I know you'll do the same now. Just do what you came to do. Finish the mission."

Ashely salutes the Commander before walking away. Shepard tries to follow her but within a few steps Chief Williams fades into the shadows just as her mother did minutes before.

Shepard looks back towards the boy. The urgency and anxiety is fading even as he just stands there in the distance and stares at her. Blank yet expectant, waiting. I was here before. The realization blossoms slowly in her mind.

She feels something drawing her in the opposite direction, away from him and she follows. The whispers are hushed now. It's darker and colder where she walks towards, yet the this new pull still has her as she moves through the shadowy figures. Another voice calls to her. She's heard it before, here in this place, but it's different this time. It's not hollow sounding now. It sounds real.

"Shepard," the salarian scientist emerging from the shadows briskly greets her. "Good to see you. Know you have doubts about reapers and Crucible."

"Mordin," she says. "I'm sorry I couldn't do more for you on Tuchanka." Leaving him at the elevator to the Shroud was one of the hardest things she ever had to do.

"No," Dr. Solus quickly waves away her apology. "Wouldn't have it any other way. I've accomplished many things in my life. But curing the genophage will be my greatest legacy. Besides, had to be me."

"Someone else would have gotten it wrong," she softly repeats the same phrase she said to him on Tuchanka. She knows he's right, but it still hurts.

"Exactly. Same applies to you also," he says in his typical swift manner, before pausing for a moment in thought. "Shepard, important to remember that what happens next... Do not doubt yourself."

Shepard nods thoughtfully at his words as she watches him fade back into the shadows. She hopes there will be more. The lost, the people she'd never see again.

An odd light catches her attention further down the path and she continues. The whispers and echos are no more. There's only the soft sounds of wind and the rustling of leaves. Within a few steps she recognizes the source of light. It is not shining as brightly as it usually did, but she still knows it's him.

"Shepard-Commander," the synthetic voice speaks to her. "We thank you for freeing us from the Old Machines and for facilitating peace with the creators. Geth can now build our future alongside organics."

Legion. She sighs with an odd sense of comfort as the geth materializes from the darkness. The bluish glow from his optic lens catches the jagged edge of the salvaged N7 armor on his chest. Her armor. She smiles at him, remembering his explanation for using her damaged chestplate to repair his frame.

Her friendship with him is a strange one. Shepard wasn't sure at the time she was doing the right thing when she reactivated him on the Normandy, but there was something different about this geth. She never regretted the decision.

"It was an honor to have you on my team, Legion. Your sacrifice proves the geth are so much more than just machines." She'd never given much thought before to what makes a soul, but the thought of Legion's soul becoming part of the geth consensus, of living on through his people, gives her some peace.

"The honor is mine. The probability of true peace among organics and synthetics has greatly increased as a direct result of your actions." Legion pauses for a moment, the panels of his head flutter in thought and agitation.

"You are... an unknown," he confesses to her. "Unique even among organics. The Old Machines underestimate you, Shepard-Commander. This is their weakness. You have been a good friend to the geth. And to me." He stretches his hand towards her.

"The feeling is mutual, Legion. Thank you," Shepard says shaking the geth's hand, repeating the gesture that began their friendship. That original handshake was landmark for relations between geth and organics since the Morning War, but this is special for a different reason. This is a farewell between friends.

She watches as Legion walks away from her, and as he turns to give her a final glance before he returns to the darkness just like the others. Commander Shepard closes her eyes for a moment, exhaustion slowly encroaching upon her, but she is hoping for one more person to walk out of the shadows.

Please be here. Her hopeful thoughts become pleas as she walks deeper into the darkness. The fog is thick. She can barely make out the moving shadows from the dark trees. The wind blows colder here as well, but it doesn't matter. Where is he?

Shepard spots a tall, lean figure in the group of shifting shadows several feet in front of her. His still silhouette is outlined in the darkness by the soft gray light, causing a misty silver halo around him. Since leaving Earth, she would find herself wandering into the Normandy's Life Support room from time to time, some part of her hoping he'd be there waiting for her. Even more so after the Cerberus attack on the Citadel. After losing him.

"Thane." His name falls from her lips in a whisper of sadness and a bit of hope. She had just said farewell to the others and she wanted the chance to do the same with him.

"Siha. I'd hoped we'd have a moment more to say goodbye." Thane's deep reverberant voice gives her some solace, though hearing him confirm what she already knows this is hurts. He walks forward towards her and what little light there is in this space illuminates his features.

"That prayer you chose for me... it was beautiful Thane." Emotion threatens to overcome her as she remembers his death and she stops, not wanting to spend these final moments with him sobbing. She regains her composure and exhales before continuing. "By the way, I gave Kai Leng your regards."

"I wish I could have been there to see it." Thane smiles, standing just inches from her.

"Me too," she whispers.

"Please, do not grieve for me," he says softly to her. "I owe you a great debt, Shepard. It is because of you that I have such precious memories. Spending time with my son, stopping the collectors, your friendship. It is more than I deserve."

Things she wants to say are on the tip of her tongue, but this moment isn't for mourning and it isn't for regret. This is goodbye. He reaches for her and embraces her, pulling her close to him. Shepard returns the embrace, closing her eyes for a second before gently pushing away from him. This is about letting go.

"It's time for me to move on," he says with a wistful smile. "I have someone waiting for me across the sea. It's been too long since I've seen her."

"Then don't keep her waiting any longer. Goodbye, Thane." She returns his expression with a reflective smile of her own.

"Goodbye, siha. You have the best at your side. No matter what enemies you will face, I know they'll stand with you." Thane bows slightly to her before turning and walking back into the shadows.

She watches him unable to move as the darkness and cold envelope her. The sound of wind and leaves now gone, all Shepard is left with is silence.

Author's Notes:

Thanks again for reading and for the fave alerts!

While playing these nightmare sequences in the game, particularly on my second playthrough, I thought it would be interesting if there was another option to end the dream and some way to interact with the lost squadmates when you hear their voices. In this chapter, Shepard's subconscious mind is "breaking" the nightmare with the memory of her mother. Though it's not done in a rational way, (very few dreams are ever rational) just in more of an emotional motivation to move forward in another direction.

Shepard's never been alone in this fight and even her subconscious understands this on some level. She's able to speak to her other teammates at the FOB on Earth, but there were a few missing sadly. (Damn you, reapers!) Here she's reconciled the loss of her teammates, is given another chance to say a final goodbye, and to be reminded that she's not alone.

Plus, the people you're closest to can give some good advice if you're ready to listen. :)