Fic: Because I could not stop for Death
Title: Because I could not stop for Death
Rating: T just to be safe. Character death and a little bit of swearing.
Summary: Three ways Shepard's life could have gone and one way it did.
By the time the enforcers broke down the warehouse door, Shep was already on the roof, half a dozen of the younger gang-members tagging along. Not that she was looking out for them; old enough to run was old enough to take care of yourself in Shep’s book. But the enforcers were big and dumb and way too trigger happy for Shep’s liking and it would be better for everyone if they only found the real scumbags in the Red Streets. So here Shep was, shoving kids in front of her and running as fast as they could. Which wasn’t fast enough. Enforcers were dumb, but you’d have to be spiced to miss the fact that the roofs round here were all connected and one of the rats favourite way to move about.
There were shouts from the door and Shep’s fingers clenched more tightly around her shooter. But you couldn’t fire first with enforcers. Firing at all, first, second, last, anything, would get you killed. Not firing might get a kid killed.
Damn it.
She sped up, swerving away from the group, heading for the nearest edge. Three stories up, no such thing as an easy way down, but doable. Might have to do without her ankles for a bit, but doable. And the enforcers loved a moving target. The edge was coming, closer, closer and she leapt.
This was how she imagined flying felt like. Every single time she jumped, just that faint taste of freedom. But she couldn’t jump far enough to escape the Shipyards. Couldn’t run fast enough to avoid bullets, either.
(The bullet passed through her throat, spraying her blood across thin air. Shep was dead before she hit the ground and the kid who came to find her found nothing but bloodstains. Her body was cremated and no name was ever put to the remains.)
It hit her in the ribs. She fell the expected three stories, but couldn’t land properly and broke both legs. She would’ve been taken off by enforcers, but the kids made it down from the roof and got her out in time. Ended up owing a lot of credits to the blacked clinic they took her to, and it took a hell of a lot of work to pay it off, but that was another story.
xxx
When the shit really hit the fan on Akuze, when half of her team were already dead, when the only person who could rig a long-dis signal was dead or gone or God knew what, Shepard knew she wasn’t getting out alive. None of them were. Four N7s, three marines, one brass encrusted twit and one civilian could not take down a giant alien worm of acid-related death.
It would take more than that to make her admit that they were all going to die, of course. N7s did three impossible things before breakfast, mostly because someone had told them they couldn’t. But they were running out of medigel, grenades, hell, most of their guns weren’t even working anymore. Casper was crouched over Lyra, omni-tool glowing in the dark. Shepard’s 2IC was still alive, but there was no guarantee she would stay that way much longer. And no damn way out.
"We need to keep moving," Goodspeed said. "If that thing can chew through buildings, it can chew through bedrock."
"And go where?" Casper snapped. "The only base on this planet is toast."
"How many can we fit in the Mako?" Shepard asked.
"Legally, six. Nine could work. But that thing’s never been tested in this situation."
"It’s about to be," Shepard said. "Cas, if the next words out of your mouth are we can’t move Lyra, I will shoot you."
"Noted. We’re out of painkillers, I’ll choke her out."
"Any chance you could do the same to the brass?" Goodspeed muttered.
"Do not tempt me," Shepard said. "Go make sure that thing can still pull off a one-eighty, please. And shields would be nice. And weapons."
"Anything else? Apple crumble, a pony?"
"Don’t offer what you can’t provide, Goodspeed."
Took them almost an hour to get the Mako even vaguely operational. Shields were at fifty, weapons were still only a maybe, but Goodspeed had managed to ramp up the speed. If there was ever a time for a fucking tactical retreat, after all. Loading Lyra up was a mission all by itself and Shepard swore that she was going to make somebody pay for this clusterfuck. Someone like the complete and utter bastard pretending to be a decent officer, but there was no real way for Shepard to leave him behind for a giant alien bug, so she resisted the urge to punch his lights out. She did wedge him between two marines who were both covered in alien slime. There was always time to be petty. And then they were off.
(The Alliance searched the planet for almost a month before identifying the alien lifeform assumed responsible for the deaths of fifty-two marines, thirty-seven civilians and twelve N7 operatives. Several years later, various retired scientists turned up dead. By the time Hackett had worked out the pattern, the last surviving scientist from the classified Akuze project was dead. Lieutenant Commander Shepard was found beside him. The autopsy revealed evidence of years of intensive trauma and listed cause of death as a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head.)
The Mako ride, that last desperate dash for survival was the one part of Akuze that Shepard dreamed about regularly. Lyra dying by inches, Goodspeed choosing the wrong fucking time to be a goddamn hero and getting himself killed, Cas making it all the way onto the shuttle before the Thresher Maw’s acid destroyed his internal organs. Shepard piloting a shuttle with hands that wouldn’t stop shaking for weeks afterward. The memories didn’t change in the dreams. They didn’t have to.
xxx
"We are gathered here today to pay tribute to the brave men and women who gave their lives in the Battle of the Citadel."
Joker stood a little straighter on his crutches when he heard another disapproving cough from somewhere behind him. Fricking ceremonies. They hadn’t made him shave, at least, but that was probably only because the officials had been more concerned with finding a ceremony site that wasn’t still on fire to lecture lieutenants about personal grooming. Up on the podium, Udina kept droning on and Joker felt absolutely no shame about ignoring him. This wasn’t a real soldier’s funeral. This was a political sham, designed for the extranet, not the grieving servicemen and women. You could tell by the lack of alcohol, the abundance of speeches and foreign dignitaries.
They’d go somewhere else, when this was all done with. Head back to the Normandy with as much booze as they could scare up and get absolutely plastered, talking all the while about those who hadn’t made it this far. The Alliance had strict regs about alcohol on active ships, but who cared. They’d stolen the damn ship and nobody had even mentioned that yet, so Joker thought they’d get away with flaunting the regs on drinking. Shepard sure as hell wasn’t going to complain
(He still couldn’t get used to the idea that she was dead. He’d been taking orders from her for so long, he wasn’t sure he could follow anyone else’s. But she’d done what she wanted to do. She killed Saren, made him pay in the only way an N7 would accept for killing Ashley. Joker hoped like hell that she’d meant to survive that final battle. That fighting all those politicians and commanding officers and Council Members hadn’t robbed her of strength she needed to fight that turian bastard. But she’d sounded strong and even a little pleased with herself when she’d told him to bring the fleet in, save the Council, and ‘Don’t get a scratch on my ship or I’ll break your legs for you.’ He wished he’d banged up the Normandy a little more in that final fight, because Shep had never broken a promise she made to him before.)
Up at front, just a little to the left of the stage, stood Shepard, looking smarter than smart in the formal uniform she hated almost as much as Joker did. She caught him looking at her and nodded fractionally in acknowledgement. And then Udina called her name and she was going up onto the stage and Joker, along with every other soldier there, roared his approval. Protocol be damned.
xxx
Shepard floated in space, spinning gently, air streaming from the hole in the back of her suit, and watched the Normandy burn. She twisted as best she could, trying to reach the hole, to plug it anyway she could, but nobody had ever successfully sealed a back-breach in Z-G without any damn sealant.
The escape pods had launched. Her crew was safe. Even if she’d had to put Joker into his escape pod herself, her crew was safe. There wasn’t anyone left alive on that ship. So her job was done. Not that she wanted to go. God, she wanted to stay. But Kaiden was safe, Joker was safe. It wasn’t perfect but it was okay.
(The only way for Shepard to survive the attack on the Normandy would have been to leave Joker behind. Somewhere, sometime, another Shepard, a Shepard changed in any one of thousand tiny or huge ways, would’ve left him. Would’ve followed regs and got the hell of that ship and assumed the helmsman would have the sense to do the same. But not this Shepard. There was no other way for this to go and she’d known that since the moment the first shot rocked the ship.)
It was okay.
Joker and Kaiden and Hackett and people Shepard wouldn’t even think about, they’d all disagree with her, but in that moment, her luck run out and nothing left to do, Shepard floated in space and watched the Normandy burn.
Rating: T just to be safe. Character death and a little bit of swearing.
Summary: Three ways Shepard's life could have gone and one way it did.
By the time the enforcers broke down the warehouse door, Shep was already on the roof, half a dozen of the younger gang-members tagging along. Not that she was looking out for them; old enough to run was old enough to take care of yourself in Shep’s book. But the enforcers were big and dumb and way too trigger happy for Shep’s liking and it would be better for everyone if they only found the real scumbags in the Red Streets. So here Shep was, shoving kids in front of her and running as fast as they could. Which wasn’t fast enough. Enforcers were dumb, but you’d have to be spiced to miss the fact that the roofs round here were all connected and one of the rats favourite way to move about.
There were shouts from the door and Shep’s fingers clenched more tightly around her shooter. But you couldn’t fire first with enforcers. Firing at all, first, second, last, anything, would get you killed. Not firing might get a kid killed.
Damn it.
She sped up, swerving away from the group, heading for the nearest edge. Three stories up, no such thing as an easy way down, but doable. Might have to do without her ankles for a bit, but doable. And the enforcers loved a moving target. The edge was coming, closer, closer and she leapt.
This was how she imagined flying felt like. Every single time she jumped, just that faint taste of freedom. But she couldn’t jump far enough to escape the Shipyards. Couldn’t run fast enough to avoid bullets, either.
(The bullet passed through her throat, spraying her blood across thin air. Shep was dead before she hit the ground and the kid who came to find her found nothing but bloodstains. Her body was cremated and no name was ever put to the remains.)
It hit her in the ribs. She fell the expected three stories, but couldn’t land properly and broke both legs. She would’ve been taken off by enforcers, but the kids made it down from the roof and got her out in time. Ended up owing a lot of credits to the blacked clinic they took her to, and it took a hell of a lot of work to pay it off, but that was another story.
xxx
When the shit really hit the fan on Akuze, when half of her team were already dead, when the only person who could rig a long-dis signal was dead or gone or God knew what, Shepard knew she wasn’t getting out alive. None of them were. Four N7s, three marines, one brass encrusted twit and one civilian could not take down a giant alien worm of acid-related death.
It would take more than that to make her admit that they were all going to die, of course. N7s did three impossible things before breakfast, mostly because someone had told them they couldn’t. But they were running out of medigel, grenades, hell, most of their guns weren’t even working anymore. Casper was crouched over Lyra, omni-tool glowing in the dark. Shepard’s 2IC was still alive, but there was no guarantee she would stay that way much longer. And no damn way out.
"We need to keep moving," Goodspeed said. "If that thing can chew through buildings, it can chew through bedrock."
"And go where?" Casper snapped. "The only base on this planet is toast."
"How many can we fit in the Mako?" Shepard asked.
"Legally, six. Nine could work. But that thing’s never been tested in this situation."
"It’s about to be," Shepard said. "Cas, if the next words out of your mouth are we can’t move Lyra, I will shoot you."
"Noted. We’re out of painkillers, I’ll choke her out."
"Any chance you could do the same to the brass?" Goodspeed muttered.
"Do not tempt me," Shepard said. "Go make sure that thing can still pull off a one-eighty, please. And shields would be nice. And weapons."
"Anything else? Apple crumble, a pony?"
"Don’t offer what you can’t provide, Goodspeed."
Took them almost an hour to get the Mako even vaguely operational. Shields were at fifty, weapons were still only a maybe, but Goodspeed had managed to ramp up the speed. If there was ever a time for a fucking tactical retreat, after all. Loading Lyra up was a mission all by itself and Shepard swore that she was going to make somebody pay for this clusterfuck. Someone like the complete and utter bastard pretending to be a decent officer, but there was no real way for Shepard to leave him behind for a giant alien bug, so she resisted the urge to punch his lights out. She did wedge him between two marines who were both covered in alien slime. There was always time to be petty. And then they were off.
(The Alliance searched the planet for almost a month before identifying the alien lifeform assumed responsible for the deaths of fifty-two marines, thirty-seven civilians and twelve N7 operatives. Several years later, various retired scientists turned up dead. By the time Hackett had worked out the pattern, the last surviving scientist from the classified Akuze project was dead. Lieutenant Commander Shepard was found beside him. The autopsy revealed evidence of years of intensive trauma and listed cause of death as a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head.)
The Mako ride, that last desperate dash for survival was the one part of Akuze that Shepard dreamed about regularly. Lyra dying by inches, Goodspeed choosing the wrong fucking time to be a goddamn hero and getting himself killed, Cas making it all the way onto the shuttle before the Thresher Maw’s acid destroyed his internal organs. Shepard piloting a shuttle with hands that wouldn’t stop shaking for weeks afterward. The memories didn’t change in the dreams. They didn’t have to.
xxx
"We are gathered here today to pay tribute to the brave men and women who gave their lives in the Battle of the Citadel."
Joker stood a little straighter on his crutches when he heard another disapproving cough from somewhere behind him. Fricking ceremonies. They hadn’t made him shave, at least, but that was probably only because the officials had been more concerned with finding a ceremony site that wasn’t still on fire to lecture lieutenants about personal grooming. Up on the podium, Udina kept droning on and Joker felt absolutely no shame about ignoring him. This wasn’t a real soldier’s funeral. This was a political sham, designed for the extranet, not the grieving servicemen and women. You could tell by the lack of alcohol, the abundance of speeches and foreign dignitaries.
They’d go somewhere else, when this was all done with. Head back to the Normandy with as much booze as they could scare up and get absolutely plastered, talking all the while about those who hadn’t made it this far. The Alliance had strict regs about alcohol on active ships, but who cared. They’d stolen the damn ship and nobody had even mentioned that yet, so Joker thought they’d get away with flaunting the regs on drinking. Shepard sure as hell wasn’t going to complain
(He still couldn’t get used to the idea that she was dead. He’d been taking orders from her for so long, he wasn’t sure he could follow anyone else’s. But she’d done what she wanted to do. She killed Saren, made him pay in the only way an N7 would accept for killing Ashley. Joker hoped like hell that she’d meant to survive that final battle. That fighting all those politicians and commanding officers and Council Members hadn’t robbed her of strength she needed to fight that turian bastard. But she’d sounded strong and even a little pleased with herself when she’d told him to bring the fleet in, save the Council, and ‘Don’t get a scratch on my ship or I’ll break your legs for you.’ He wished he’d banged up the Normandy a little more in that final fight, because Shep had never broken a promise she made to him before.)
Up at front, just a little to the left of the stage, stood Shepard, looking smarter than smart in the formal uniform she hated almost as much as Joker did. She caught him looking at her and nodded fractionally in acknowledgement. And then Udina called her name and she was going up onto the stage and Joker, along with every other soldier there, roared his approval. Protocol be damned.
xxx
Shepard floated in space, spinning gently, air streaming from the hole in the back of her suit, and watched the Normandy burn. She twisted as best she could, trying to reach the hole, to plug it anyway she could, but nobody had ever successfully sealed a back-breach in Z-G without any damn sealant.
The escape pods had launched. Her crew was safe. Even if she’d had to put Joker into his escape pod herself, her crew was safe. There wasn’t anyone left alive on that ship. So her job was done. Not that she wanted to go. God, she wanted to stay. But Kaiden was safe, Joker was safe. It wasn’t perfect but it was okay.
(The only way for Shepard to survive the attack on the Normandy would have been to leave Joker behind. Somewhere, sometime, another Shepard, a Shepard changed in any one of thousand tiny or huge ways, would’ve left him. Would’ve followed regs and got the hell of that ship and assumed the helmsman would have the sense to do the same. But not this Shepard. There was no other way for this to go and she’d known that since the moment the first shot rocked the ship.)
It was okay.
Joker and Kaiden and Hackett and people Shepard wouldn’t even think about, they’d all disagree with her, but in that moment, her luck run out and nothing left to do, Shepard floated in space and watched the Normandy burn.