Shepard picked up Alenko's photo from her desk, walking in wobbly fashion into her sleeping quarters. She could not even think about simple things, like locking the door. Even the glance at the Astro-Fizz packed fridge did not mean anything. The mission left such a bad taste in her mouth, she probably could not stomach the drink.
Armor and all she flopped down on the foot of the bed, elbows on her knees, one hand tangled in her curly hair, the other gripping the picture frame.
Her throat locked up as she tried calculating the weight of three hundred five thousand lives. It was as she told Hackett: first Williams, then the Ascension, now Aratoht. Even if her efforts aided in saving the galaxy…even if her efforts aided in saving the galaxy there was no way she could avoid a trial.
She was half a Spectre again, with the Systems Alliance after her blood to prevent a war with the batarians; batarians who were looking for an excuse to fight anyway.
She hadn't even thought about all those people as 'batarians' until this moment, and found she could not do so. Batarians were scum of the universe in her mind, they always had been. Any other decent member of the species, the ones who were usually trod underfoot…they were just civilians.
And now they were casualties. "Three hundred four thousand, nine hundred forty three…" Aratoht, the Ascension, Williams, and the Council combined, all collateral damage, and those were only estimated losses. The real numbers were probably higher. She knew the words, knew the labels, knew she should not sit here mulling it over. Yet she could not escape the vain hope that maybe, maybe remorse and that sickness in her stomach over what she had done—necessary or not—was a good thing.
It kept her from being Rogers. Odd how holding herself up for comparison with Rogers was so reassuring. Rogers would throw any number of lives away and call it a necessary expenditure. Shepard had to know that she felt something, that those mounting numbers weren't just tally marks on a page somewhere. Well, she felt something and suspected it was just the tip of the iceberg. Some things were too big to wrap the mind around, and three hundred five thousand people in a single moment were a lot to process. It was as if her mind tried to process each life individually, rather than as part of a greater whole.
She tilted the photograph until she could see Alenko's face, then let it fall back again. She nearly let it slide out of her fingers as any hope she secretly cherished of somehow finding a way to fix things between them flickered and went out.
"What…" she whispered, sliding off the foot of the bed—and dragging some of the blanket with her—to sit on the floor, "what did I do to deserve all this?" Tears stung her eyes but did not fall. It was not a question she expected to have answered. For a moment, for a single split second she even wished the terrible burden onto someone else's shoulders, something she had never done before. For a single moment, she did not want to be Jalissa A. Shepard anymore. It was too hard.
She had once wanted a life empty except for service…and now she had it back, with a vengeance.
She had tried so hard, and while she had slowed the Reapers again…it wasn't enough to save anyone. It was just borrowed time. The battle had always felt futile, but she kept that thought down where it could only whisper to her in the quiet silence of the middle of her sleep shift.
Now it felt absolutely futile. Even if the Reapers were stopped, she would either be a dead hero, or a living bone of contention, a monster—to quote the media, with that al-Jilani woman at the head of the line. 'Decent human beings' didn't rack up that kind of body count; and people were not known for rationality; civilians were not known for understanding military decisions.
She had been damned from the beginning: from the moment she set foot on Elysium's soil.
They were not thoughts she could share with anyone and knowing there was no one she could say anything to made her grit her teeth against a scream, made the burden seem all the heavier. She could not say it, she could not write it down; it all had to stay behind her teeth.
"I wish," she addressed the photograph, tilting it so she could see it again. "I wish you were here." Of course, such a wish required the suspension of disbelief. She made the wish with the fallacy that this would be like the aftermath of the Destiny Ascension.
She couldn't say any of what she was feeling, but it would be something to have someone to grip her hand and let her grip back; it would be something to have someone to put an arm around her shoulders; it would be something to have someone who could wrap strong arms around her; it would be something to, for a couple of seconds, not have to be the strong one.
The thought brought the tears back to her eyes. "EDI, lock me in."
The AI must have been watching, because the display did not appear, though the door locked automatically. She even had the suspicion that the AI was 'covering her ears' and 'looking the other way' to afford her a little privacy.
Shepard let out a single dry sob, the one which she had repressed so dutifully for what felt like a long time. Clasping her hands before her face as best she could with the photograph in hand she put her elbows on her knees, the plates slipping a little. She had rarely been so glad that her quarters were a private suite. Her armor had never felt so ineffective at protecting her.