Chapter Title: A sensible man will remember that the eyes may be confused in two ways - by a change from light to darkness or from darkness to light; and he will recognize that the same thing happens to the soul. ~Plato
Light can be gentle, dangerous, dreamlike, bare, living, dead, misty, clear, hot, dark, violet, springlike, falling, straight, sensual, limited, poisonous, calm and soft. ~Sven Nykvist
Slight Edit 8-5-10
Light.
Bright white.
Searing.
Lancing through her closed eyes and into her skull.
She would have groaned, but...somehow...her body couldn't quite produce the sound. She felt...submerged. Or maybe encased. In ice.
Or adrift.
In space.
She remembered...
space.
Space was dark...you were supposed to go toward the light when you died...but...
someone...an asari...in dark clothing...sprawled across the floor at her feet...said there was no light...someone was crying...Liara? Liara was crying...her mother was dead...Shepard remembered...
she was dying.
She opened her eyes.
Light burned through her like a star going nova. Or like a ship...her ship...exploding.
And slowly began to resolve itself into the image of something mundane...like a lamp. She frowned. That seemed...wrong...
She reached up...to embrace eternity or to move the damn lamp out of her face, she wasn't quite sure which...Once she figured that out, she imagined things might begin to make more sense.
A hand grabbed hers, pushed it back against something hard, cool and smooth. The hand seemed alien, unfamiliar. Not one of her squad. Not one of her crew. What did that mean-was it good or bad they weren't here?
Words. More words. Names...something about waking...something about sedatives...
Slate blue eyes staring into hers with something like possession...something like concern...
She felt a flicker of confusion, a flicker of annoyance bordering on fear.
Darkness flowed over her...
There was no light.
There was nothing...and she gave into it with something like relief.
Sound.
A voice.
A name.
Shepard.
A familiar name.
Her name.
The voice wanted her to do something...
You have to get up.
She was lying on a cold, hard, slab. The stiffness in her neck, the knots in her shoulders, the ache in her back flared to life. She must have been lying there a very long time. She reached up and almost-absent-mindedly wrenched her jaw into place. Her skin felt rough and foreign beneath her fingers. She hauled herself upright, wincing at the lingering tenderness in her ribs.
Death certainly was uncomfortable.
And weirdly familiar.
Suiting up in armor, just as she had done every day of her life since she turned eighteen was almost unsettling, it was so surreal. A feeling only intensified by the realization that the armor was almost her armor.
Almost, but not quite.
It was black and grey with the bold red stripe on the shoulder...but...the plates were different, lighter. The material was different, too. And the N7 was missing from the collar. There was another insignia there in its place...one that she couldn't quite place...but that made her stomach lurch with unpleasant recognition on sight...as if she ought to remember...
The weapon was different, too. But its weight felt natural in her hand. Comfortable. Comforting.
The first sound of a mechanical voice gave her a jolt similar to the sight of the insignia on her armor. It was so...ordinary...expected...almost routine...and, yet, it was...different. These weren't geth, they were mechs.
It was a sad commentary on her life that geth would have been less confusing.
Still, mechs were as easy-if not easier-to destroy than geth.
Their absence made the space around her seem huge, echoing and empty.
Like space.
It was probably best not to think of that.
Still, she felt very, very alone...
and very, very exposed without Kaidan and Garrus on her three and nine.
Kaidan's face, a mask, frozen, staring, stricken.
The pods.
Joker.
Garrus.
Tali.
Liara.
They'd made it free and clear.
She knew they had.
She had to believe that.
But if they'd survived...where were they?
Why weren't they here?
Wherever here was...