The Bridge Between
Prologue Act: Fractured Stars
Chapter 2: Left Behind
1814 hours, December 10th, 2186 CE
The bridge, The SSV Normandy SR-2
Garrus stood at the viewport, talons pressed against the cold glass as he watched the battle rage around the Citadel. The massive space station hung against the backdrop of Earth, its five arms now fully extended in a configuration he'd never seen before. The Crucible, that mysterious Prothean superweapon they'd spent months building, was now docked at its center like some bizarre mechanical parasite.
The fighting around it was unlike anything he'd ever witnessed. Hundreds of ships—human, turian, asari, salarian, even geth and quarian—swarmed around the massive Reaper forces. Energy weapons cut through the darkness of space, and explosions bloomed in silence against the void.
"They're getting desperate," he muttered to himself, mandibles tight against his face.
The Reapers had always been methodical, coldly efficient in their harvesting. But in the last few hours, as the Crucible neared completion, their tactics had changed. They'd become more aggressive, more erratic—almost frenzied in their attacks. It reminded him of the shift he'd observed after they'd discovered the Leviathans, as if the ancient machines were... afraid.
Garrus had never thought of the Reapers as capable of fear. But watching them now, throwing themselves at the allied fleets with abandon, he couldn't help but wonder. If the Reapers were afraid of the Crucible, maybe there was hope after all.
A cruiser exploded in the distance, its hull splitting apart in a silent flash of orange and white. Garrus didn't know which species it belonged to. At this point, it hardly mattered. They were all in this together now, united against extinction. The stakes couldn't be higher—everyone knew that. This was the end, one way or another.
His hand drifted to his side, where his armor was cracked and scorched. Pain radiated through his body with each breath, a reminder of how close he'd come to death on the ground in London. His blood had dried in patches on his armor, mixing with the grime and ash of Earth's ruined streets.
He should have been down there with her. With Shepard.
The memory of their final moments together cut deeper than any physical wound. Shepard, bloodied and limping, her N7 armor shattered in places, ordering the evacuation as Harbinger descended. He'd refused to leave at first, determined to stay by her side until the end.
"You gotta get out of here," she'd said, her voice steady despite everything.
"And you've gotta be kidding me."
She shook her head, "Don't argue, Garrus."
"We're in this till the end. I—" he'd started to reply, but she'd cut him off.
"No matter what happens here... you know I love you. I always will."
Then she'd turned and run toward the beam, toward the Citadel, toward what they both knew might be certain death. And he'd let her go. Because she'd ordered it. Because he was too injured to keep up. Because he'd failed her when it mattered most.
A dull thud echoed through the ship, and Garrus realized he'd slammed his fist into the hull. His arm throbbed in protest, adding to the symphony of pain that was his body. He looked down at himself—at the smoking, cracked remains of his armor, at the blue blood that had seeped through in places—and knew that Shepard had been right. He was in no condition to fight.
But he wasn't too injured to die by her side. He should have insisted. Should have followed her, no matter what.
It wouldn't have been the first time he'd disobeyed orders for her sake. After she'd died the first time—killed by the Collectors above Alchera—he'd tried to honor her memory by becoming something more than just a failed C-Sec officer. He'd gone to Omega, formed a team, tried to make a difference the way she would have. And he'd failed spectacularly, gotten his entire squad killed through his own arrogance and naivety.
He'd been so lost after her death. Adrift without her guidance, her steady presence, her unwavering moral compass. The only time he'd ever truly felt like he was doing what was right was when he was with her. And when she'd found him again on Omega, given him a second chance, he'd sworn to himself that he would never leave her side again.
Somewhere along the way, their friendship had deepened into something more. Something he'd never dared hope for. Garrus Vakarian, the failed C-Sec officer, the disgraced vigilante, the turian with the scarred face and the even more scarred soul—he'd never imagined that someone like Shepard could love him. That anyone could.
But she had. Spirits, she had. And he'd loved her back with an intensity that sometimes frightened him. He would have done anything for her. Followed her anywhere. Into hell itself, if necessary.
And now she was facing hell alone.
A sudden movement near the Citadel caught his attention. The massive structure was changing again, its arms folding backward in a configuration he'd never seen before. Something was happening. Something big.
Garrus pushed away from the viewport and rushed toward the cockpit, ignoring the pain that shot through his body with each step. Joker and EDI were there, their hands moving in a blur over the controls.
"What's happening?" he demanded, leaning over Joker's seat.
"The Crucible," EDI replied, her synthetic voice calm as ever. "It appears to be activating."
Garrus watched as a brilliant amber glow began to form at the heart of the Citadel, where the Crucible was docked. It pulsed like a heartbeat, growing stronger with each passing second.
"Can we get closer?" he asked. "Shepard's still in there. We need to—"
"All fleets!" Admiral Hackett's voice cut through the comms, tense but controlled. "The Crucible is armed. Disengage and head to the rendezvous point."
Those words knocked the wind from Garrus's lungs. They were too late. Whatever was happening with the Crucible, it was already in motion. And Shepard was still inside.
"I repeat: disengage and get the hell out of here!"
Garrus looked at Joker, whose hands had stilled over the controls. The pilot's face was frozen in an expression of disbelief and anguish. He understood what was at stake—they all did. EDI was still working, her fingers dancing over holographic interfaces, probably trying to calculate some way to reach the Citadel before the Crucible fired.
But Garrus knew it was futile. The amber glow was intensifying, spreading throughout the Citadel's structure. Whatever the Crucible was designed to do, it was happening now. And if they stayed, they'd be caught in it.
Despite the crushing pain in his chest—a pain that had nothing to do with his physical injuries—Garrus knew what Shepard would want. She'd want them to survive. To carry on. To make her sacrifice mean something.
"Joker," he said, his dual-toned voice rough with emotion. "We need to go."
"But Shepard—"
"Would want us to live." Garrus placed a hand on the pilot's shoulder, careful not to apply too much pressure. "You know that."
For a moment, Joker didn't move. Then, with a muttered curse, he engaged the Normandy's drive core. The ship lurched forward, turning away from the Citadel and accelerating toward the edge of the Sol system.
Garrus stayed in the cockpit, watching as the distance between them and the Citadel grew. He couldn't tear his eyes away, couldn't stop hoping for some miracle. That somehow, Shepard would contact them. That she'd found a way to survive, as she always had before.
The Normandy was headed for the Charon Relay, the massive Prothean device that would allow them to jump to the rendezvous point in the Exodus Cluster. All around them, allied ships were doing the same, breaking off from the battle and retreating at full speed.
Then it happened. A massive pulse of energy erupted from the Citadel, expanding outward in a wave of crimson light. It engulfed the nearest Reapers first, then spread to the allied ships that hadn't managed to retreat in time. Garrus watched in horror as the wave continued to expand, moving faster than any ship could hope to outrun.
"Joker—"
"I see it!" The pilot's hands were flying over the controls, pushing the Normandy's engines beyond their safety limits. "EDI, divert all non-essential power to the drive core!"
"Acknowledged," EDI replied, her voice as calm as ever despite the dire situation. "Jeff, I'm detecting unusual energy signatures in the approaching wave. It may have unpredictable effects on our systems."
The Charon Relay loomed ahead, growing larger in the viewport as they approached. But the red wave was gaining on them, swallowing space behind them at a terrifying rate.
"We're not going to make it," Garrus said quietly, more to himself than to the others.
"The hell we're not!" Joker shot back, his face set in grim determination. "I didn't keep this ship in one piece through a suicide mission just to lose it now!"
The Normandy shuddered as Joker pushed it harder, the frame of the ship groaning in protest. Warning lights flashed across the control panels, but Joker ignored them, focused solely on reaching the relay before the energy wave caught them.
Garrus gripped the back of Joker's seat, his eyes fixed on the approaching relay. They were close now, so close. Maybe they had a chance after all.
Then the first tendrils of the energy wave brushed against the Normandy's hull. The ship bucked violently, throwing Garrus against the bulkhead. Alarms began blaring throughout the vessel, and the lights flickered ominously.
"EDI?" Joker called, his voice tight with concern. "What's happening?"
There was no response. Garrus looked over at EDI's physical platform, but it sat motionless in the co-pilot's seat, the blue glow of her eyes dimmed to nothing.
"EDI!" Joker tried again, more desperate now. "Talk to me!"
"That pulse isn't just disabling Reapers," Garrus noted, his mandibles tight with concern. "It's targeting anything synthetic—including EDI."
"No, no, no," Joker muttered, frantically trying to reroute systems. "Come on, baby, stay with me..."
The Normandy lurched again as another, stronger pulse hit them. More alarms joined the cacophony, and several control panels went dark completely. The ship was dying around them, systems failing one by one as the energy wave penetrated deeper into its structure.
The Charon Relay was directly ahead now, its massive element zero core glowing with power. Joker managed to align the Normandy with its approach vector, but Garrus could see that the relay itself was being affected by the energy wave. Its normally blue glow was flickering, disrupted by pulses of angry red.
"This is going to be rough," Joker warned, his hands never stopping their dance across the remaining functional controls. "Brace for—"
The rest of his words were lost as the Normandy made contact with the relay's mass effect corridor. Normally, the transition was smooth—a brief sensation of acceleration, then the sudden appearance of a new star system. But this time, it felt like being torn apart and reassembled incorrectly. The ship shook violently, metal screaming in protest as structural integrity fields fluctuated and failed.
Garrus was thrown to the floor, his already battered body protesting the new abuse. Through watering eyes, he saw Joker still strapped into his pilot's seat, fighting to maintain control of the dying ship. EDI's platform remained motionless, unresponsive to the chaos around it.
As darkness began to creep in at the edges of his vision, Garrus found his thoughts turning back to Shepard. To her smile, rare but brilliant when it appeared. To the way she'd looked at him that last night before the assault on Cronos Station, her eyes full of love and hope for a future they both knew might never come.
"Meet you at the bar," he whispered, though he knew she couldn't hear him.
Then the darkness claimed him completely, and Garrus Vakarian knew no more.
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