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Chapter Text

She thought about choosing destruction. It was her first instinct, and Shepard knew that her first instincts were usually pretty spot on. They had served her millions of times in combat, life, and general galaxy saving duties that she seemed to have to do every single bloody day. But, as she walked towards the levers, EDI's face came into her mind unbidden. Joker's smile. The change in him since he had fallen for her. Images of them played across her mind, memories, movies she knew well. Then followed Legion. Legion, her brave soldier, her friend, her biggest fan. Her martyr. On seeing his face, face? Was it a face? Did geth have faces? His visage, then, she stopped and nearly fell forward. Her right knee was clearly bent slightly in the wrong direction, and the accompanying pinch of tendons stifled between broken bones sent shivers up her spine. At least three of her ribs were broken, and one of those was a floater threatening to pierce her skin. Not the first time but, fuck, it was always terrible. Her left foot was completely useless, and she balanced on the outside of it so that she could stand up and speak to this child-image, this haunter of her nightmares, this fucking demon, this person who had given her this choice. Why her? Why had it always been her? Commander Shepard. She knew she could handle it but, christ and goddamnit. Why.

In that moment she knew what she had to do. The course of her gimpy stumble changed towards synthesis. Though the idea of the reapers surviving in any capacity hurt everything she was made of, she knew that it was the right thing to do. These reapers really thought that they were right. They thought that they were saving the galaxy. And lord knows the geth- and EDI, EDI! They didn't deserve to die. Not that Shepard did either. But she'd had a great run. Her face felt wet. A hand came up to touch it and came away a deep red, after scratching her across the forehead in what already felt like an open wound. Huh. That's not where fingers are supposed to be. That's not how many fingers there are supposed to be either... Damnit. Keep walking.

Garrus. Oh, god. Garrus. What was Garrus going to do. He was strong, he was going to be okay, he didn't need her that much… who was she kidding? He was going to be destroyed. Could she sacrifice that? Pause. Stop. Garrus, her prince. Her archangel. Her vigilante. Her fucking stubborn, adorable man. Her reason to come back from this station. Her dream of sitting on a tropical beach. Jesus, a margarita sounded amazing right now. Cool. Salty. Alcohol? Really? Right now? When the fate of the universe is at stake? The pool of blood on the floor was starting to seep in through her boots, and they were the best boots. She was Commander Shepard. The cuts on her face started to sting, and she screamed with an agony she knew was in her somewhere, but she could never express. The salt. From her eyes, she was crying, wasn't she? Giving up her life for the galaxy was easy. She had done that before. Giving up Garrus's? … She didn't know.

A deep breath. A lick of the lips. Neck cracks right, neck cracks left. A little gasp of pain on that second crack. If she lives through this, that vertebra is going to need some reconstruction. "I'm sorry Garrus," she whispered, eyes shut tight, face squished. "I'm so, so, sorry."

Eyes open and gaze locks on the green beam. Synthesis. So that this will never, ever happen again. "I'm sorry Garrus!" she screamed in agony as she collapsed to the floor, and endeavored to crawl towards the beam, her shattered right hand pulling her along the alien tile. The green light changes to his face. His eyes, peering at her, one open, the other through his sniper monocle. He wouldn't want it like this. She didn't want… She stood up. It took her about thirty seconds longer than she thought possible, and she had once been dead for two years. Not that she remembered it… she chuckled. Last time she was surprised by it. This time, she would go down like a champion.

"Garrus," she said calmly, tears openly streaming down her face, dropping off of her chin and mixing with the red gore below, "I love you. I'm sorry. But, I know you'll understand."

She ran. Sprinted, into the beam. Strength exploded out of her poor broken body like Hercules's transformation into a god and she knew she had made the best possible choice. As she hit the beam, she felt a sense of serenity she only felt when she was with him. She noticed his arms wrapping around her. Those arms she enjoyed kissing whenever he flexed, to make fun of him and also tell him how she cherished him. "Garrus, my love. I'm so sorry. I love you. I'm so sorry," she chanted as she nuzzled into his chest. He was so surprisingly warm without armor. His chest so solid, yet soft. His talons stroked her hair. It was down? Of course it was down. They were in bed. She was going to sleep. It was bedtime.

"Shhhh. It's fine. It's going to be alright. I love you too. I love you always," he whispered back to her. The rhythmic brushes of her hair, the beat of his words, the sweet caress of puffs of air on her forehead; they all fell into perfect sync as she smiled despite herself. She was home. Safe. In the arms of her love.

Commander Shepard drifted off into a peaceful slumber.

Chapter Text

"I don't understand, we're flying in the wrong direction," Garrus Vakarian said as he strolled into the cockpit of the Normandy SR2.

His sniper rifle was still strapped to his back, and he hadn't had time to clean his armor yet. He looked like hell, but physically, he hadn't sustained much injury in the final assault. An unexpected outcome, given the sheer number of banshees they had been forced to deal with.

No, his physical body was fine. His mind was another matter. That was in pain.

"Joker. Shepard's in there. We should be going towards the Citadel instead of away from it, and you know that. What's your plan?" He cocked his head to the side and continued his query, former C-Sec officer training radiating through his eyes. "You do have a plan, don't you?"

Joker's face turned down towards the floor, not even pausing to make eye contact with EDI on the way down. He never did that. If he turned his head to the right, he looked for her eyes. Or, her boobs. Something. Not this time. This time his eyes went from straight ahead, ignoring Garrus completely, to down at the floor.

"I'm following orders, Garrus. You know her better than all of us, you have to know she gave me orders."

Garrus moved closer to Joker's chair, talons gripping the fabric just above his shoulders. "Since when are you a man who follows orders to the letter? Try again".

Joker sat up tall in his chair, eyes locked on Garrus's, sneer of pain scarring his face. "Since always! Do you think I like the fact that we're flying away from her while she's on a ticking time bomb? Last time she died she did it to save me, and I can't do the same thing for her."

Garrus bowed his head as he turned away, knowing that was the truth. He walked two steps left, walked two steps right, and then was distracted by a flash of light from outside the window. "What was that?" It didn't look like any laser gun he had ever seen. And he knew big guns.

"It appeared to be a piece of... computer code floating through space in our general direction," replied EDI, who had stayed out of the drama until that moment. Though her voice was generally grounded, there was a note of perplexion in her tone that scared the shit out of Garrus.

EDI is the fastest, smartest AI in the world and she has no idea what that was.

That's a bad sign.

"What the shit!" yelled Joker as more streaks of bright green light began to zoom past, shaking the ship and nearly knocking Joker forwards, out of his chair.

It was coming from behind them.

Garrus ran towards the back of the ship, slamming the door to navigation open and vaulting through the holographic map. What the hell was firing at them? Who?

He rushed down the stairs to the starboard observation deck where he found a hapless Kaiden Alenko transfixed by what was going on outside of the window. It did look like computer code.

The streams of light bent around in ninety degree angles, numbers and letters in languages unknown flowing through them, but distinct to the eye. If it hadn't been so terrifying and problematic, it would have been beautiful. For someone accustomed to watching countless calibrations all day long, it was a revelation in mathematical brilliance.

But, it was trying to kill them, so it had to die. Calculus.

Alenko was frozen in wonder, being completely useless, so Garrus took a moment to assess the situation and tried to look past the beams.

The Citadel. The beams were coming from the Citadel. Some of them were going in all different directions.

The Crucible had fired.

Spirits, she had done it. They had done it. It was over.

Except that it wasn't, because beams of computational death were about to engulf the ship. He noticed that the speed of the ship had been growing steadily faster since he left Joker and EDI, and that they were beginning to outrace the beams.

Where were they going? He scanned the visible stars and... goddamnit. The relay. They were escaping.

That was the exact opposite of what he wanted them to be doing.

"Joker, EDI, now would probably be an excellent time to go back and get her before the entire Citadel explodes," he shouted into the comm, "This might be our only chance!"

Kaiden awoke from his horror and caught Garrus's eye. Garrus could tell that Kaiden had already given up. He screamed into the com,"I won't give up on her, Joker, she didn't give up on you".

Instead of Joker, EDI replied, the cool rationality back in her voice. "Not only would that be against our orders, Commander Vakarian, but the beam is not firing at us. We happen to be in the line of fire. Commander Shepard is the one who set off the Crucible. All of the beams heading towards the Reapers are exponentially smaller than this one".

Another glance out the window confirmed that her analysis was correct, per usual. The beams heading towards the Reapers, not to mention Earth and Mars, entire planets full of people, were miniature compared with what was chasing them. Which would not be something Shepard would do. She wasn't going to juice up the guns and point them at her own ship.

The spirits knew that husks weren't going to fire the Crucible because he was fairly certain that they didn't have the mental capacity, so, yes. Something was up. The Illusive Man? No. Even he wasn't that insane. Was he?

"The beam apparently chasing us seems to be heading directly for the Mass Relay. Its trajectory is nearly identical to our own. We are too close to it. If we do not jump before the beam hits, we will face destruction along with the Relay. It's our only means of self-preservation," EDI finished, and Garrus understood.

Shepard was exploding the Relays. They were Reaper tech. They always had been. Just as the Citadel had been Reaper tech, and, who knows? The Crucible probably was too. Everything was Reaper tech. The Normandy was probably Reaper tech. Actually, since Cerberus built it, the thing probably was. Damn.

That's when the true problem dawned on him. "EDI. One question. If Shepard explodes the relay, is there a way to go back and retrieve her?"

The comm fell silent.

Chapter Text

Garrus's body hurt. Badly.

That was not the smoothest landing he had ever experienced. Nor, was it the worst.

After all, there were those couple of times that Shepard let Wrex drive the Mako. Somehow, that krogan was always attracted to the highest mountains possible, and would do flips off of them, because that was particularly manly and krogan, or something like that. What good times. All things considered, which weren't limited to just a malfunctioning navigation and an exploding Mass Relay, Joker had done exceptionally well.

Garrus attempted to stand, and realized that he was pinned underneath something. It was a shelf.

Where was he? He must have been knocked out. His eyes came into focus with the blinking lights of the ship.

A room with no windows. Yet, his eyes were adjusting particularly rapidly. Odd.

He had always been able to see in the dark proficiently, but this rate of change was especially impressive.

Must be adrenaline.

He wiggled his back and deduced that this was a shelf on top of him.

Right, he had hidden underneath Shepard's desk in the final impact. Was it the safest, or most intelligent place to hole up? No. But he had been in their bedroom, and it's where he ended up.

Finally, he endeavored to get up, laboredly pushing the shelf off of his shoulders.

Off flew the glass cage, the hamster nowhere in sight. Oh, space hamster. He never understood Shepard's obsession with that little rodent.

Shepard. Spirits, where was Shepard? What had happened?

His thoughts began to align. They were flying away from the Mass Relay because it was going to explode because Shepard fired the Crucible thus attacking the Mass Relay.

Why? Unsure. She must have had a good reason.

That's when he noticed that his thoughts were following a strange sort of pattern. He had always been a fairly logical man, driven occasionally by revenge or a zest for heroics, but who isn't on occasion.

This was different, though. It was almost as if he was viewing the world around him in a grid. A spreadsheet. Things added up a more coherently and more quickly than they should. Why was he thinking like this? Since when did he use the word "thus" in his thought patterns? He had to get out of this ship.

Stepping over some puddles of water and dead fish, he tried to open the door to exit their chambers. Her chambers. Shepard. Locked, barred, or broken. Door didn't work.

He went over to the comm. "EDI? Are you there? Could you open the door to let me out, I'm stuck in the Captain's chambers."

"Negative, Commander Vakarian. I'm unsure if I am able to do that as of now. Wait, let me try a workaround," she replied.

Her voice sounded changed. It wasn't the lack of surety that he experienced in her when they were surrounded by the computer code.

This was something different entirely. She sounded... less mechanical. The timbre was different. Her musicality altered.

The door slid open. "Successful attempt. Come on out, Garrus." She called him Garrus. EDI had never called him Garrus. Things were a bit odd around here today.

Not only that, but the room was now completely bright.

The switch, though he had already noticed that it had begun a few minutes ago, was subtle enough that he hadn't recognized how far it had come. There were actually no lights on in this room now. The few flickering bulbs had shone their last, and now sat dormant in their fixtures, yet Garrus could see everything.

He raised his hands to rub at his eyes, and pulled them away in surprise. His eyes felt different. They felt hard. Cold.

He ran into the bathroom and peered at himself in the mirror. Perhaps they had been hit by the beam after all. His eyes glowed an eery bright green, and through the irises swam the same type of computational patterns that he and Alenko had watched through the windows of the starboard observation deck.

But it didn't stop there. The green was running through his scar tissue as well. It was most likely running under all of his skin, but under the scar tissue, it was vibrant, vivid, unmasked by layers of thick plating. Tiny signals pulsing, coursing throughout his being. And they were changing him.

Though he had escaped the final assault shockingly unharmed, he had sustained a small bullet graze on his forehead. Nothing serious. Shallow wound. Just a few layers of skin off, a little blood. He had applied medigel immediately and wasn't the last concerned about it. He had forgotten, honestly, until this minute. Medigel was the best. With the undercurrents of green, the wound shone, but not in a static sort of way.

The wound... it was closing. He held himself up with both arms, hands wrapped around the sink for support , as he witnessed his computer code fixing itself. The processors tying him back together.

His computer code? What?

"I have to get downstairs," he said to himself, as he splashed himself with some water, and stomped through the door.

He didn't hurt anymore. Anywhere.

Thank the spirits, the elevator functioned. As he rode it down, he was reminded of more moments with Shepard and Urdnot Wrex. That big lug.

Somehow, it was easier to think about Wrex than Shepard right now. Wrex was probably fine. Killing him was a task suited to few, even reapers. He was a force to be reckoned with.

So was Shepard, but she was a squishy human. Delicate.

He hated thinking about her as delicate because she was such an excellent commander and soldier, but when he held her in his arms and felt her skin, she was the most...

Ding! The elevator stopped, and broke his train of thought. It was probably better that way. He rushed out of the elevator and ran smack into someone. His concentration scatter from remembering making love to Shepard to facing the harsh realities of the moment had left him shaken and unaware.

"Keelah, Garrus, we just crash landed, it's not an emergency evacuation," Tali attempted a joke, lifting herself off the floor, her back turned.

As she turned around, she could see that her joke had not merely flopped, it had traumatized poor Garrus. His green eyes spoke of another emergency evacuation. One that had not gone very well. Wait, green eyes?

"Tali. You don't have your mask on," Garrus said softly as he accepted her outstretched hand and stood up. He had never seen her without the mask. No one had, at least not on their crew, anyway.

She was stunningly gorgeous. Soft purple skin, and glowing green eyes, like his own. This seemed to be a trend.

"Yes, well, it got cracked in the impact, something I didn't know was a possibility. I was down in engineering like usual, and I got thrown over a railing. I'm a silly bosh'tet. I took it off to quickly replace it with my spare and found that I could breathe normally. That shouldn't be able to happen, but it is, so... I left it off. The atmosphere of this planet must be safe. Do I look okay?" She blushed, but instead of pink, like Shepard's cheeks turned at a blush, her skin filled with the iridescent green, computations under her very skin.

"Have you looked in a mirror lately?" he asked quizzically, referencing the green, but realizing a second too late that he probably came off like an asshole as her pretty face filled with an ashamed scowl. "No! I mean... your face is... very nice and your courage to show it is...uh... very impressive. You're pretty Tali. Congratulations. But, you're also green, but it's okay because I'm green too. I don't know why. But we're green. Like computers."

"What do you mean that we're..." Tali trailed off as she turned and saw herself in the reflective paneling of the ship.

Her eyes were bright green. Her cheeks glowed green. Her suit was infused with green. "Oh Keelah..."

They were interrupted by a sound from the cockpit. Garrus and Tali turned to one another as they heard the sounded again. It sounded like a holler, but as opposed to one of pain, as they had become so depressingly accustomed to lately, it was one of joy.

Ding! Liara and Javik stepped out of the elevator, into the navigation area, exchanging odd glances with the two crewmates already there as they heard the sound again, much more coherent this time.

It was learly Joker's voice, uttering three beautiful words, "EDI. You're real!"

"Yes, Jeff. It seems that the transformation we have undergone did not just add programming to your system, it modified mine as well. You now work off of much more functional, logical parameters, and I seem to have acquired the physical trait your species refers to as, "flesh," which is an intriguing development."

"Shit, EDI, I need to kiss you," Joker cheered, as the four now turned to one another with smiles of combined joy and awkwardness.

"Humans," Javik piped in with a shake of his head.

"Perhaps we should allow them some time together in the, uh, cockpit," Liara suggested, cringing a little at her own unintentional double entendre, and then smiling at the idea anyway. "Garrus, Tali, I'm relieved to see that you're okay. After reviewing my Shadow broker files, I believe that EDI is correct. The beam that chased us through the relay transformed us, and we are now a combination of organic and synthetic. It's fascinating."

"We're both organic and synthetic. How does that work? Is that like how they rebuilt Shepard? What is it?" asked Garrus, who had reached a similar conclusion, but lacked the scientific lingo to put it how Liara had... put it.

Sometimes he wondered who sounded more like a computer, Liara or EDI. He guessed that now they all would.

"I believe so. But I'm not actually sure, you see, there are no known studies of this type of technology, which I can only assume is some manner of reaper tech that Shepard was able to repurpose for her own goals. Why she turned us all into halflings, I'm not sure," Liara responded, looking less confident than her words assured. And her words were not all that confident.

"It was the Crucible," Javik said with confidence. "In my cycle, when we began to build the Crucible, the explanation was that it would bring an everlasting peace to the universe. My people were not a peaceful race, and we were less interested in this than a destruction of those that attempted to obliterate us. Shepard is different. If she taught me one thing being on this crew, it is that all species can work together to make something work, including organic and synthetic."

"Beautifully put, Javik, and if the Reaper's main goal was to erase organic life because it would always clash with synthetic life, by blending the two together... that problem ceases to exist," finished Liara.

"Damn. That was a smart explanation," Garrus said, marveling in how shockingly open minded Javik had just sounded. Javik! Full of rage Javik! If anyone in the galaxy was more motivated by revenge and a desire to rid evil from the world, it was him, and he had just sounded like a bad children's vid. This was odd. Very odd.

Just when he thought it couldn't possibly get more odd, the sounds from the other room changed.

Moans. Definitely moans.

"Time to get off this ship," Garrus motioned to the others to follow him out the door, which unfortunately moved them closer to the enthusiastic noises from behind the closed door. "I don't want to think about that right now," he said, and turned to the others. "You won't need your gear out here. We're machines now."

He popped open the door and viewed... paradise.

Lush, tropical trees, spanning the spectrum of greens from forests to chartreuses, with leaves gargantuan similar to the "palms" Shepard promised to show him on Earth one day.

Shepard. Spirits.

Flowers of eye-catching purples, pinks and oranges decorated the landscape, and framed the beach with utter perfection.

Beach! Everything was beach, strewn with bright shells that caught and reflected light into thousands of prismatic patterns across the sand and nearby waters. The waters themselves were a gorgeous aquamarine, clearly pure water.

Stacks of round black rocks brought a zen sort of quality to the scene, and Garrus wondered if they had developed naturally, or if they were placed there by a sentient species. Or perhaps an animal. A species that had not yet arisen.

Small aquatic creatures of all kinds frolicked along the coastline and in the shallow depths. Miniature mammalians attempted to catch fish-like creatures with rainbow metallic scales. No other beings, as far as the eye could see. All was quiet. Crashing waves and an animal noise every few moments, but all of them relaxing. Rejuvenating.

This really was paradise.

It was everything he had hoped to find after this battle.

Everything... except her.