The Final Victories

Kol'Xirel vas Dinbi was a typical engineer. AI specialization. He came from a long line of quarians who had previously worked on the geth, and who had let their skills be passed down. His father, in fact, had been killed on the Alarei, when Admiral Rael'Zorah's experiments had gone wrong.

So he was a natural choice to be put on the team attempting to reactivate the geth, supposedly working under Admiral Tali'Zorah. Granted, the Admiral would often spend days working on a "side project" on Earth, so typically they were left attempting to do whatever they had discussed the previous week.

Kol typically worked long after the other engineers decided to call it quits, sitting in his lab in the research ship and poking at the geth prime model in front of him. He'd stared at it for days on end, trying to determine just exactly how he was supposed to reactivate what couldn't be reactivated. He'd chart a new plan that would only fail, or that would power on a unit but not the processes inside it.

So when he sketched out the three-hundredth way to reactivate the geth, then sat down at his bench, he wasn't expecting anything different. After all the quarians were going to have to give up at some point, and they could just completely reconstruct them. Except the galaxy would never go for that.

He worked for hours into his lab-ship's night cycle. A tweak there. An adjustment here.

Hours passed, and he finally stifled a yawn behind his helmet. One last try to reconnect the stupid repaired machine to its stupid repaired processors.

"All right, you bosh'tet," he hissed, trying to weasel two fingers into the geth. "Come ... on ..."

A pair of wires connected, and he jolted back with a yelp as it singed his suit. Clamping down seals around his fingers, he frowned and stood. "Fine," he snapped. "Fine. Just . . . Sit there, like the big stupid hunk of metal you are. I-"

He stopped, as the optic light of the geth suddenly flickered once, then fell dark. A second later it bloomed to full brightness, and Kol's eyes widened. The machine slowly sat up, looking around the room before its optic lit on the quarian, shock still, next to it.

"Greetings, Creator," it said. "This unit requests information."

Kol dropped his wrench, letting the tool clatter to the ground. "I-I-I-oh. All right?"

"Have the Old Machines been deactivated?"

Kol took a moment to answer. "Y-yes?" It cocked its optic, studying him.

"Where are the geth?"

He stared at the prime for a second, then cleared his throat. "Well, ah, it's complicated."

#

Joker hobbled onto the bridge of the Normandy and settled down in his chair with a sigh.

There really wasn't much of a call to be on ships, except that a lot of people still didn't feel safe or comfortable on Earth after months of enemy occupation. They were docked in the slowly-rebuilding Vancouver Alliance spaceport, most of the crew out trying to help with cleanup or their families. And even a year later they were having problems reaching the most remote places of the planet for potential survivors, even as a number of scientists and some special guests put the power grids and other essential systems back on for the biggest cities.

Special guests, indeed. Ten months after the battle, a quarian engineer had accidentally managed to reactivate a geth.

It'd been a heyday. One went up, and the quarians were able to activate half of the geth fleet in two months, and were quickly working on the rest. Meanwhile, the geth moved to help restore Earth's vital systems, rebuild teh Citadel, and help on the mass relay.

And the Citadel and the relay were almost completely rebuilt, and several more cities on Earth had started to turn the lights back on. There was even talk of sending a team through the Charon relay to see where it went, and if any other relays had been so damaged.

If they had it'd be a hell of a time trying to reactivate them all, and most of them would be dead long before they could be. Unless someone was looking into interstellar drives that didn't rely on the mass effect phenomenon, which he didn't think anyone was.

Joker opened the intercom. "How's it goin', Tali?"

"Could be worse." He jumped, spinning his chair to spot the quarian standing behind him.

"You're sneakier than I remember."

She shrugged, her arms crossed over her chest. "So. What did you need?"

"I was just checking on the progress. You know, on EDI." Tali had managed a renewed spurt of hope in attempting to restore the AI after the geth had first been reactivated. She'd been in the AI core for weeks, both with the server and with EDI's former platform, sleeping in one of the abandoned crew beds.

"I don't know." She shrugged again. "Her platform is a little more . . . complicated than the geths'. The geth were easy to reactivate, comparatively."

"But I must say that Tali'Zorah is a very skilled engineer." Joker was certain that damn quarian was smirking behind her helmet when EDI sidestepped out of the airlock. She was back in the Alliance fatigues she'd started wearing on the ship before the end, her metal hands folded behind her back. "Hello, Jeff."

Joker couldn't speak for a moment, eyes locked on the AI, then stood. EDI stepped forward, and Tali grinned behind her mask as they wordlessly embraced.

"You ever spontaneously deactivate again," he threatened, clinging to her. EDI ducked her head to account for their height difference, resting it on his shoulder.

"I assure you, I do not intend to do so again. Especially not, as Tali'Zorah explained, in the case of a large explosion."

"Hold on." Joker stepped back. "I think we need to take a trip and visit someone."

"And don't forget the celebration," Tali said helpfully. Joker blinked, then nodded.

"Right. Almost forgot. Damn."

EDI smiled, looking between the two of them. "I feel as if I should put on something more appropriate."

#

Shepard was initially alone on the first anniversary of the end of the Reaper War.

No one had quite determined what they should call the last battle. "The Battle of the Century" sounded too flippant, and many argued it should be the "Battle to End all Battles," but then the humans reminded them that the last time they did that a whole other war happened that was worst than the initial one and no one wanted to risk that. And she wasn't alone by choice, though that was what she preferred. She still couldn't remember what had happened on the Citadel, despite everyone - Hackett, her mother, Kaidan, Joker, Garrus, Tali, Liara - asking her what she remembered.

She remembered Anderson dying next to her.

She remembered shooting the Illusive Man, the way she'd sworn she would.

She remembered sending Kaidan away.

That was it. Nothing more. She had a nagging feeling that she'd done something though, something devastating, that whatever had happened to EDI and the geth had been her fault.

Shepard tucked herself back against her bed, sighing as she let herself fall limp against the raised mattress. She'd hoped to be out of her damn bed at this point, but the most action she was getting was sliding into a wheelchair.

They were cautiously optimistic though. In her last therapy session she'd been able to walk a good distance with a walker before one of her legs had decided to stop cooperating, and she'd managed to stand for at least ten minutes with something to lean on. She was convinced she could start doing things unassisted, but her therapists argued with her. She was still in danger sometimes of losing her balance. They didn't want to risk her falling and messing things up.

At least they weren't saying she'd possibly not walk again anymore.

And to top it off, the shrink was actually sort of helping, despite how long it'd taken Shepard to warm up to her.

But today? Today she should be walking. She should be back somewhere that wasn't this hospital with Kaidan, lost in gentle touches and whispered words. Not trapped here.

And that'd put her in a mood. A foul one. Or, at least, one where the hospital staff knew it was better to let the galactic hero wallow in her own misery, rather than bother her. Some would call it sulking. Others would just call it moping. She called it completely warranted.

"Commander? You have visitors."

"Not interested," she replied tonelessly, closing her eyes.

"Aww. Damn. I feel so loved." She opened her eyes as Joker stepped in, leaning heavily on his long-distance crutch. "How you feeling?"

Shepard managed a weak smile. "Mm."

"That bad, huh?" Joker settled down on the edge of her bed.

"Getting better." She picked at the sheets. "Just wish it'd go faster."

"Hey." He poked her leg. "You have no right to complain there, Commander. Now you just get to see life through the eyes of Joker."

She let one edge of her mouth tuck up in a grin. "Now I see why you're such a miserable old coot all the time."

"Old?!" Joker protested. "I'll show you old. Just . . . Let me get my . . . Crutch up here . . ." Shepard laughed and managed to grab one side of his cruch. "Hey! I need that!"

Kaidan was halfway down the hall when he heard a noise he hadn't in a year - Shepard actually laughing, not forced, not rough. Just a pure, honest laugh. He picked up his pace, grinning when he spotted Tali and an unknown woman in naval blues - the same skirted dress uniform Shepard favored, actually - outside her room. Through the mirror he spotted Joker halfheartedly wresting his crutch from Shepard, who let go of it to keep the man from falling off the edge of her hospital bed.

"Christ, you been lifting weights or something?" Joker barked, protectively hugging his crutch to his chest.

Now that Kaidan thought about it, they were both more animated than they'd been in months.

"It's good to hear that, isn't it?" Tali asked quietly. Kaidan nodded.

"Yeah. It is."

"Then I understand she hasn't for some time," the unknown female said. Kaidan's eyes widened as his head jerked around.

"EDI?"

"Yes," she replied with a nod. She was even wearing a cap with her uniform - how it was staying on, he wasn't sure. "It is good to see you, Major Alenko."

Kaidan blinked several times. "But, how -"

"I managed to reactivate her today," Tali said. She sounded proud. "Her processors and platform were far more intricate than the geth's."

"How much do you remember?" Kaidan asked. EDI blinked.

"My last back-up was between the attack on Cronos Station, and the attack on Earth. I do not remember anything after getting information on the Crucible. Tali'Zorah has since filled me in."

The quarian held up her hand. "I've been poking at your platform for over two years, EDI. I think we're past the surnames."

"Very well, Tali." She nodded with a small smile. "And thank you."

"Don't mention it." Tali nodded at the door. "Are you going to say hello?"

EDI glanced at Kaidan, who nodded. "If you want. Just . . . Don't ask her about the battle. She doesn't remember much anyway."

The AI nodded. "I will keep that in mind."

And with that, EDI stepped through the door. Shepard didn't look up for a second, Joker busy entertaining her with some comment or story or another. From the looks of her face and his hand motions, he may have been recounting the meeting he and Kaidan had recently been forced to attend where an elcor accidentally tripped and knocked over Sparatus and Velarn. He had just been in the process of trying to demonstrate with his hands the way the salarian and turian had ended up tangled when Shepard glanced at the door and froze, her eyes widening.

"E-EDI?"

EDI stood awkwardly by the door. "Hello, Shepard," she replied.

"I . . . But I thought . . ." She glanced between Kaidan, Joker, and Tali. "I don't understand."

"The geth were reactivated a couple of months ago." She nodded. Kaidan had told her. "I just extended the same idea to EDI and her platform. And you can see it worked out."

"I . . . It's good to see you," she said finally. That nagging feeling that she'd been the cause of EDI's sudden deactivation, and the Normandy's crash, flared up somewhere. But she wasn't sure and it didn't matter. EDI was here, the geth were here, the crew had made it back completely safely.

"Hey," Kaidan interrupted gently. She looked up at him. "Want to go for a walk? Or, um . . ." When her face fell, he cleared his throat. "By that I mean you get to sit around while I cater to your every need, as usual."

Joker made a whipping motion, and Kaidan glared at him.

"Heh. I suppose when you put it that way." She raised an eyebrow. "Where are we going?"

"Just around. I brought you clothes if you want." He held up the bag in his hands. "I thought it might be a nice change from the hospital gown."

"Sure. Give me a second." She paused, then glanced down at her legs. Kaidan shook his head.

"You won't have to worry about pants if you don't want to."

"Man, I never get that luxury," Joker complained. Shepard pulled off his hat and tossed it into a nearby chair. "Ow! Hey! That thing's stuck on, you know!"

"Go on, shoo," she chided. Joker held out his hand and EDI helped him to his feet, letting him fetch his hat, and the trio left. Kaidan helped Shepard swing her legs over the side of the bed and undid the ties on the back of her hospital gown.

"What's wrong?" he said quietly when his hand unintentionally brushed her bare back. He could feel her shaking.

"It's . . . It's nothing," she replied. He sat down next to her and caught her chin between his thumb and forefinger.

"Hey. Talk to me."

"It's, um . . ." She tried to look away, but he held her still.

"Marrakech . . . sweetheart." Her eyes darted away as she swallowed nervously.

"It's just that you h-haven't seen me since -"

Kaidan tilted her head, leaning into her lips. Shepard froze for a second before letting him pull her gently into his arms. He pulled back from the kiss just far enough that their noses touched, their eyes still partially lidded.

"Why are you so worried?" he asked quietly. "You don't think I'd love you any less, do you?"

She swallowed, shifting slightly, though she made no attempt to push away from him. "I just . . . I don't want to lose you the way I've lost everything else to this war. And . . . I know it's me being stupid."

"Yeah. It is." He gently pressed a flurry of kisses along her jaw, satisfied when she leaned her head back the smallest bit and a small sigh slipped through her lips. "I'm not leaving." He pulled back again and looked down at her seriously. "I'm not. I promise."

She smiled weakly. "I know. Like I said, I know I'm being stupid."

"Well." He rubbed her back, then shook out the shirt in his bag and handed it to her. Shepard pulled it on, requiring his help when she lost track of her hands at once point, and followed it with the comfortable pair of track pants he'd brought with him. Once dressed, he took her hands in his seriously.

"All right," he said. "You want to try it?"

Shepard glanced over at her wheelchair, sitting folded in a corner of her room. "I . . . yes," she said finally, looking back over at him with a serious nod. "Yeah."

"All right." Kaidan positioned himself next to her, and wrapped his arm around her waist. She looped hers around his neck, half-turning into him. "On three." Shepard nodded. "Right. One. Two. Three."

Kaidan helped her to her feet. Her grip around his neck tightened as she adjusted to having her feet on the floor, but she nodded. "All right."

"Okay. Easy now." Each step felt like it took an hour, but they made it to the wheelchair with only a few near-falls when her knee had nearly collapsed beneath them and one of her ankles had twisted. But Kaidan had been ready and within five minutes he was helping her settle down in her wheelchair. "Want a blanket?"

Shepard glanced down at her legs. It was hard to tell through the track pants but her legs were just beginning to regain any muscle and looked small and chickeny. "Yeah," she said, suddenly self conscious. Kaidan leaned forward and kissed her forehead, then pulled out a knit blanket from the bag.

"From my mom," he said, as he tucked it around her hips. "She made you a sweater too. Same type she sent me for Christmas that year on the SR1."

Shepard grinned, smoothing it down. It was the jewel-green blanket she'd watched Helena knit for several weeks and drooled over, then had never seen again."It's a lot nicer than the hospital blankets."

"Uh-huh," he agreed. "There we go." He finished and kissed her gently. "Now, don't try to get me to break you out or anything."

She scowled. "Damn."

Kaidan wheeled her out into the hallway and nodded as they passed a pair of nurses. Michael stopped them to check on Shepard for a few seconds, but she waved him off. She hadn't been on IVs or oxygen for over three months, after all - it wasn't her fault that the doctors had taken everything cautiously slow with her. Michael finally let them pass and Kaidan rolled her out of the hospital's PT wing.

"So. Where are we going?" Shepard asked.

"I thought you might want to get outside. There's a courtyard on the second floor." He rolled her into the elevator, and she leaned her head back on the wheelchair. Kaidan grinned down at her and leaned down to kiss her forehead. "Sound good?"

"Sounds wonderful."

The elevator reopened and he pushed her out. Shepard leaned back again, looking up at him. He glanced back down and grinned. "What?"

"Just . . ." She smiled weakly. "Just thinking about how much I love you."

"Well." Shepard's head jerked up. Garrus was leaning against the open arch to the courtyard, arms crossed over his broad chest. "Look what the varren carried in."

"I feel like I should be offended by that," Kaidan replied. Garrus' mandibles flared as he reached out to tap one of Shepard's hands with a talon.

"How're you feeling, Shepard?"

She shrugged. "Okay. I haven't seen you that much."

"Someone let it slip that Wrex and I don't hate each other. Victus has had me helping make sure Wrex keeps the krogan and the Terminus fleet under control. Same with Zaeed. It's kept me a bit too busy to make hospital runs, you know?"

Shepard grinned. "It's fine. Someone has to keep Wrex in line."

"Isn't that the truth." Garrus glanced up. "Everyone's here, Kaidan."

Shepard looked up. "Everyone?"

Garrus grinned again and stepped through, letting Kaidan wheel her out. Shepard gasped.

When Garrus had said everyone, he'd meant everyone. It was where Joker, EDI, and Tali had apparently disappeared to, Joker already having stolen one of the benches with Jack perched on the arm next to him. Wrex and Grunt were on the other side of the balcony talking to Cortez and James, all four apparently exchanging some sort of amusing story judging by the way James was motioning and Grunt kept punching one three-fingered hand with the other. The rest of the crew milled somewhere in between - Miranda and Liara leaning on the balcony with their backs to the door, probably plotting world domination, Kasumi perched on the bench next to Joker laughing about something with Tali, and Javik hovering back in the corner looking typically grumpy and likely muttering about primitives under his breath.

"Hey, there you are," Joker finally said. "We brought pizza." He held up a box, and Shepard couldn't help but stare helplessly at it. Miranda spun in a second, snatching the box out of his hands.

"Until I can be sure that there's no further damage you know-"

"It's just one piece," Joker protested. Shepard smiled weakly.

"No, no, it's fine," she said. "So. Wow. This really is almost everyone, isn't it?"

"No thanks to someone," James said, casting a dark look at Javik. The Prothean shrugged.

"Celebrations were-"

"Punishable by death in the Empire," the most recent crew of the Normandy interrupted in unison. Javik scowled again.

Surrounded by everyone it was almost easy for her to forget, just for a moment, that she was still confined to her chair. It was exactly what it should have been. Her and her mismatched crew of misfits, just having crested over the point where they would want to kill one another and could stand on a small hospital balcony for several hours just so she wasn't celebrating alone. It wasn't about her, which was how she'd preferred it.

Three hours later, just as it was falling dark, Kaidan quietly returned to the corner where she was laughing with Wrex and Javik. He had never been happier to have planned this with Joker several weeks before - now that EDI was back, and Shepard was in decent spirits, nothing could have been better than this. And he was sure that she hadn't laughed this much, or this honestly, for months. Perhaps years.

"Hey," he said, leaning over her. "I don't want to cut this off, but . . ."

"Right. Humans celebrate by blowing shit up," Wrex said gruffly.

"Vancouver's doing fireworks?" Shepard looked up at Kaidan. "Considering that there've been a million new cases of stress disorders that all involve shit blowing up?"

"You know the human race," Kaidan replied with a shrug. "Have a lot of things blow up, blow up more things to celebrate it. Do you want to try it out, or . . ."

Shepard pursed her lips, then ducked her head with a sigh. "I'd really . . . Er . . ." She cleared her throat. "I think I'll pass on the fireworks."

Wrex chuckled and patted the arm of her wheelchair, making it creak. He gave the chair a dubious look. "Get your ass better, Shepard. Bakara's talking about naming the next one after you if you don't hurry up and start walking."

"Well. We can't have that," Shepard retorted. Wrex laughed.

Fifteen minutes later they'd said their farewells - everyone had to go back to whatever they'd been doing, after all - and Kaidan had wheeled her back to her room, folding the blanket over the end of her bed. "You ready?"

"Yeah." She held out her hand, and Kaidan took it then wrapped his arm back around her waist. "No, no, let me try."

Kaidan scrutinized her for a second. "Shepard-"

"I trust you. You're not going to let me fall."

"Okay. Just . . . hold on, all right? If anything happens I'm going to hear it from your doctors."

She gave him a small smile. "I'm sure nothing's going to happen."

Kaidan held out his arm, letting her grip onto it. "All right. Ready?"

"Yeah." He braced himself as she pulled herself to her feet, teeth clenched with the effort. She wobbled slightly, and he stuck out his hand to steady her. "I'm fine!" she snapped.

"Okay," he placated. Shepard got her feet steady underneath her and nodded. "Ready?"

"Yeah." She carefully took a step forward, and Kaidan made sure to match it. They kept it up, Shepard taking the smallest, most carefully placed step forward, and Kaidan making sure to keep her exact pace as she clung to his arm for dear life. Her face was set in that grim determination she met everything on the battlefield with, and he felt it tug at his heart.

God, he loved her.

It took them some time to make their way to the bed despite its short distance, and Shepard collapsed down on it. Exhaustion had already started to show on her face, both from the exertion of walking almost on her own and from being surrounded by people for the first time in months. Kaidan kicked off his boots, laying back on the bed and holding out his arms. Shepard sighed, scooting back so she could swing her legs onto the cot and snuggling back into his chest. "You all right?" he asked. She nodded, curling into him. Kaidan held her against him, twining his fingers over her waist.

"Shouldn't be celebrating like this," she said quietly. Kaidan lifted his head. "Should be doing more. You know."

He chuckled. "I, uh, might have taken you up on that," he said, tilting her head. "But then I remembered that Miranda was around here, and she has that 'Shepard-Is-Doing-Something-Stupid' sense that starts tingling every time you do something she disapproves of." She laughed. "Besides. There will be plenty of time for that."

Shepard smiled tiredly.

Fortunately she was asleep by the time the fireworks began. Kaidan didn't leave, letting his eyes droop closed.

No, this was a perfectly fine way to celebrate.

A/N:

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