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timptoe · 5 months

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As the Revel Meets the Day

And this is the second piece, which I wrote in less than a week. Four times someone sees Shepard in pain, and one time Shepard finally, finally has peace.

Because sometimes, even during the longest night of the longest year, you get a glimpse of the light returning.

Read it on Ao3.

let me die, let me drown lay my bones in the ground I will still come around when the time for sleep is through

over hill, over dale through the valley and vale do not weep, do not wail I am coming home to you - The Oh Hellos, “Thus Always to Tyrants”

—

pain

awful, excruciating pain

why

why can I feel pain

I shouldn’t be here

I should be done

I made the choice

a choice between three, but not a choice

not really

only one option, pull the gun, fire at the weak point blow the whole thing to hell blow all of them to hell for us for them for him

Kaidan

I’m here

Kaidan

—-

He grunts as the bulkhead in front of them collapses forward. “That was too easy,” he mutters into his comm.

“Commander Bailey, what is that?” comes the low, terrified voice of the kid on his flank. Not a soldier, not even an adult, just a teenager he’d found huddled in a corner of the Presidium when the Reapers invaded. One of the few survivors he’d managed to hide in a burned-out storefront while the Reapers transported the whole goddamn Citadel to Earth.

Earth. He can see it up there, in the cracks—the chasms—in the ceiling above his head. The automatic mass effect fields are holding the air in for now, but he’s got no idea how long that’s gonna be for, not since that wave of red energy burst through the Citadel and fried anything with an on switch, from the internal communications array to his gun’s targeting computer to the fucking keepers.

But not everything electrical. Not the mass effect fields automatically keeping gravity constant and the atmosphere stable. Not the helmets he and the kid are wearing on the off chance the atmosphere becomes unstable. And not the display screens all around the station, every one of which had started displaying the same message in the instant before the red wave swept through.

FIND HIM. And a set of coordinates.

“That,” Bailey says, answering the kid’s question, “is what we’re looking for. I think.”

It’s a pile of rubble, but it’s not. He’s no expert, but even with just a glance he can see that the tech half-buried amongst the twisted metal and sheared polymers is far, far beyond anything he’s ever seen on the Citadel or in any Alliance installation. He can’t even begin to guess what some of those pieces do, or even what material they’re made of. And really, he doesn’t care.

FIND HIM.

Somebody needs to be found.

“Alright folks,” he calls into his comm, gesturing to the gathered team behind him, “just like the last two times.”

Getting to this part of the Citadel was no mean feat. Along the way, they’d encountered more than a dozen other survivors who’d somehow survived the Reaper invasion, some of them drawn this direction by the message on the screens, others needing to rescued from rubble just like this.

Well. Not just like this.

But rubble’s rubble, and the team seems just as determined as Bailey to figure out what that final, unblinking message means. So they go to work.

It’s hours of digging. Hours of moving massive pieces of who-the-hell-knows-what. Hours of breaks, working in shifts, wondering out loud what that red wave was, why all the Reaper troops they encountered on the way were dead, why the Reaper ships they can just barely see through the chasms in the ceiling seem to be just floating derelicts, who it is that’s waiting under the rubble. Hours.

Until the moment comes.

“Commander, I think I found something!” the kid yells into his comm. Immediately, Bailey’s on his feet and running, lead in the pit of his stomach. He stops where the kid’s crouched, struggling to pull part of a bulkhead up.

Up and off of a pair of N7 greaves.

Bailey’s heart stops for the barest of moments. Holy shit. Then he bellows, “Over here!”

In seconds, dozens of hands have joined his and the kid’s, clutching at the bulkhead, lifting it carefully, revealing more of the buried figure. Precious seconds tick by as more of the rubble is cleared, more of the body is revealed, legs crushed but held together by state-of-the-art armor, chestplate all but melted away, bits of metal fused to the skin underneath but moving—somehow moving—with labored breath. The unmistakable red stripe on the right pauldron. The face, bruised and bloodied almost beyond recognition. Except for the single, piercing blue eye that locks onto Bailey.

“How…” Bailey says breathlessly.

“Who is it, Commander?” the kid asks.

Bailey kneels down next to the figure, gently takes his broken hand, feels the fingers weakly grip his. Something stirs within him, an emotion he doesn’t dare name, something he hasn’t felt since the Reapers took Earth.

Maybe it’s gonna be alright.

He squeezes back and whispers, “It’s Shepard.”

Read the rest on Ao3.

#mass effect #mass effect 3 #kaidan alenko #male shepard #mshenko #longest night #post-destroy #i've got a lot of headcanons about what happens on the Citadel and Earth after Destroy #also eventually EDI comes back don't worry I'll eventually write that fic #just nice to have a little writing mojo back at the end of this stupid year #because sometimes the light really does come back #my writing

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goatsorcery · 2 years

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People Like Us Don't Get Eternity (Mass Effect Fic)

After the war and the reapers, Shepard, back from the dead for a second time, struggles to find her place in a galaxy that has mourned her as a martyr.

Read complete fic on AO3: Link

Read the first chapter below:

It wasn’t the first time Shepard found herself buried under the weight of rubble after saving the galaxy, though this victory on the Citadel wasn’t one she could just walk away from. She could feel her fingers and toes barely moving as she tried to push herself off the ground. The world around her was hazy, debris still smoldering. But hope came in the form of the red emergency lights that tried to cut through the thick smoke clouding the room. The Citadel still had electricity, at least enough to power some emergency systems. To Shepard, that was all she needed. Some sign of hope that things could continue on after she chose to destroy the Reapers.

Shepard’s consciousness didn’t last long, just enough to notice the emergency lights, and keepers scuttling about. Even if no one found her, she finally felt as though she had won. Though worries about Garrus and her crew plagued her as her vision faded to black once more…

Visions of Harbinger haunted Shepard’s restless sleep. The sound of reapers as they descended on Earth. Flashes of pain in moments of awareness. Shepard instinctively moved her arms, attempting to push whatever heaviness was keeping her pinned down. When her arms felt no resistance, she opened her eyes. The carnage of the Citadel had been replaced with the sterility of a hospital, though still worse for wear. Shepard moved to stand, but felt hands push her back down. “Slow down there, Commander.”

To her left, a doctor she hadn’t noticed before. Shepard didn’t have to look twice to notice the alliance uniform and was relieved to not find herself in Cerberus’s hands again. “Where’s the Normandy? Where am I?” she asked, her voice much weaker than she expected.

The alliance doctor sighed and walked to the far wall. What Shepard had assumed was some sort of service panel was a set of mechanical blinds. The doctor pushed the controls, reveling a familiar view of the Citadel. “You’re at Huerta, commander.”

Shepard, craning her neck, could tell it was in a better state than last she saw it, but there was still much to be done. “The Citadel?”

“Surprised us too, but those keepers really know what they’re doing.”

Shepard stared over the Citadel, looking worse for wear, but clearly nothing that couldn’t be fixed. The catalyst was right about that, at least. Shepard almost feared asking again, after not getting a response the first time. “And the Normandy?”

“Helping to repair the relays. Whatever that weapon did, it knocked everything out.”

Shepard could feel a slight smile on her face, though she found facial expressions to be a bit painful to make. The doctor picked up on this. “Your implants had to be replaced. Say what you will about Cerberus, they did have the upper leg on tech like this. Turian hardware might take some getting used to.”

“Turian?”

“And Krogan as well, actually. They’re still working together, somehow. We’ll see if it lasts.”

Shepard looked out the window again, watching ships zip around as if nothing had even happened. “Are com buoys up?”

“Some have been repaired, but most are still not operational.”

Shepard continued to stare at the Citadel. The alliance doctor could tell that wasn’t actually her question. “We can get a message to the Normandy, Commander, but it’ll take some time.”

“I need to--,” Instinctively, Shepard moved to stand again, but was stopped by her own pain rather than the doctor’s interference. She groaned and leaned back slowly, white-knuckling and gritting her teeth, “I guess I can wait.”

~~~

Though Palaven was one of the first council homeworlds the reapers attacked, it did also have the advantage of being a priority on clean up. Only a handful of months after the reapers’ destruction, and there were already massive restoration projects underway. The galaxy’s unity didn’t dissolve after the end of the war, some out of respect for Shepard’s sacrifice, other’s because they saw that they only way forward was together. The threat of the reapers didn’t leave with them, memories were still fresh, and even if they never faced another reaper again, there were still other things in the galaxy that one species could never handle alone.

The Normandy was assigned to oversee the repairs of the relays, though less so “assigned” and moreso demanded by the Normandy’s new commander, Ashley. As a spectre and dedicated alliance solider, she was Admiral Hackett’s first choice when it came to the decision of replacing Shepard. Though Hackett was aware that Shepard was receiving medical treatment on the Citadel, he didn’t share the hope the doctors had for her recovery, and kept all records of her condition classified even from the Normandy crew.

Ashley was resistant at first. She never saw herself with a command of her own, and certainly couldn’t see herself replacing Shepard. But, if anyone was going to lead the Normandy crew, it wasn’t going to be some outsider. Adjusting to leading the Normandy was smooth enough, though she found herself appreciating how easy Shepard made the job look.

There was always the feeling of being in someone else’s shoes, and it didn’t help that those shoes belonged to the hero of the galaxy, their savior against the reapers. Liara was always the first to protest when Ashley would discount her own abilities, but even with constant reassurance from the rest of the squad mates she never felt like she truly made the cut.

Most days, she was just grateful the Normandy was still in one piece, with all her crew inside. She found comfort in fact the old squad stayed. When the war ended, and the dust settled, Ashley feared they’d all go back to their home worlds leaving her to lead a new crew alone. But, with travel so limited, there wasn’t much of a chance to.

Garrus got lucky that his home system was part of Normandy’s mission. The relay in Apien’s Crest was vital to the surrounding systems, and the Normandy was tasked with overseeing its repairs, along with deliveries of supplies to Palaven. Somehow, Garrus’ family had made it off Palaven alive, and saw them often as their duty as Turians dictated they help repair the relay as well. With Palaven how it was just a few short months ago, it felt surreal to see it get back on its feet so soon.

The Normandy felt the same way. Though it had been mostly spared from serious damage and its crew compliment was nearly identical, the ship still felt off. When not paying too close attention, one could mistake it for the Normandy SR1, back when everyone was comfortable believing reapers were just a myth. But Garrus felt the obvious emptiness, the elephant in every room. Long calibrations in the main battery were mostly silent and lonely, except for the occasional interruptions from Tali or Liara checking in on him.

Passing by the names of those they lost made it hard to walk to a simple elevator ride or to go to crew quarters. Shepard’s name on a plaque, the only thing that really had changed about the ship. There were more times than he wanted to admit that he’d press the button for the captain’s quarters, not thinking. Once, after doing shots with James, Garrus made it all the way to the door of the captain’s quarters before realizing his mistake. Ashley was of course understanding when she opened the door, but Garrus couldn’t help but feel like a burden.

He knew Shepard would want him to move on, to find happiness and direction without her, but a part of him was still not convinced he had to. During late night strolls around the ship, Garrus would contemplate taking the plaque down. He had regretted it since the moment he hung it up but realized that moment was more for the rest of the squad than it was for him. He worried it was his own stubbornness rather than actual chance that made him believe Shepard was still alive. There had been so many close calls before, this just didn’t feel like the end to him. Everyone else seemed to stroll around as normal, Garrus didn’t want to believe Shepard wouldn’t get that chance as well.

After getting drunker than responsible one night with Tali in the lounge, Garrus passed by the wall of names again. Something drew him to it, probably the turian ale overrunning his system, enough that all other considerations were put aside. He took the plaque and launched it out an airlock.

The next morning, the plaque’s absence was immediately noticed. Garrus swore it was a dream, but the empty space above Admiral Anderson’s name made it clear. Though, it didn’t last long. By that afternoon, another plaque had been printed and hung on the wall, identical to the last as if nothing had changed.

“You think it was one of the new recruits as some kind of joke?” Tali said as she tried and missed getting a straw in her induction port.

“Who would joke about something like that?” Liara’s serious tone overshadowed her drunken state. She leaned back and took another sip.

“Yeah, new recruit hazing is bound to happen, but I don’t know.” James took a shot and refilled his glass, then refilled for Ashley and Garrus as well.

Gathering in the lounge for drinks had become a regular recurrence, though tonight Ashley was too distracted by work on her PDA to notice. However, Garrus slammed his shot down quick, trying to avoid saying anything that might worry them. “We’re still all so caught up on this? There’s a new one up already.”

But he realized that wasn’t quite the right thing to say either, as they all turned to him, even getting Ashley to look up from her PDA.

“Sorry,” Garrus quickly caught himself. “Just seems silly.”

Liara set her glass down a bit too hard, “After everything she sacrificed, least she deserves is a plaque without it being desecrated.”

“You think I don’t know that,” Garrus stood, bumping the table and tipping some glasses, though James’ reflexes caught the bottle. “I’m just tired of acting as though some plaque is any consolation.”

He turned to leave, bumping the table again, but everyone grabbed their glasses in time. As soon as the doors shut behind Garrus, they all turned to each other. James poured himself another shot, “So, Garrus definitely took the plaque down, no?”

Tali sighed, “I’ve been worried he’s still in denial.”

“I’ve been monitoring alliance and Citadel communications since they started cleaning up debris, just in case there’s any word of…” Liara trailed off, she didn’t have to finish her sentence. “But, I haven’t heard anything yet.”

Ashley set down her PDA and took her shot, “It’d be nice for closure, at least. You catch anything about Shepard’s mom?”

Liara shook her head, “Not since she tried to reach out to Garrus.”

“He never responded?”

“He didn’t know what to say,” Tali said, “What really is there to say?”

They all stared a moment at their empty glasses. “At least there’s a Shepard still running around the galaxy,” James said as he filled his glass again.

~~~

Shepard stood at the window, staring out over the Citadel, propping herself up against the wall. Her doctors had warned about standing for extended periods of time while her new implants healed, but she was tired of laying around. It was the first time in a long time where she wasn’t off to fight some threat, or save a colony, or build an army, and all she could do was stare as the Citadel slowly became itself again.

BEEP. The telecom on the wall flashed, though Shepard didn’t turn to see it. “You have a visitor, Commander.”

Before she could ask who, Admiral Hackett stepped into the room. Shepard’s muscle memory brought her arm up to salute, though her healing implants had other ideas, sending a wave of pain through her arm, causing her to grimace. Hackett threw up his hand, “You don’t have to do all that for me, Shepard. You’re the one worth saluting here.”

Shepard tried to remain standing, but quickly grew tired without the wall to support her. Hackett moved a chair over to her, which she thanked him for as she sat. “I have to admit, I’m a bit surprised to see you on your feet at all, Shepard.”

“You really think anything can keep me down for long?” She said, a bit out of breath.

Hackett let out a short, dry laugh, “Your track record does prove otherwise.”

He moved to the window and looked out over the Citadel. “If you had told me when the reapers attacked Earth that we’d be here today, able to talk without a looming threat… actually I believe you did a few times. But I couldn’t fathom it, none of us could.”

Shepard considered telling Hackett about the true nature of the crucible and the catalyst, but she wondered if it was real anyhow. The last thing she remembered for sure was Hackett’s voice telling her to activate the weapon and pressing the button to launch. For all she knew, the catalyst and the choice was all in her head. She repeatedly went over it in her mind, but every time it felt more like a dream. She couldn’t decide which option was more comforting; that it wasn’t a choice, or that it was.

“About the Normandy…”

Hackett turned from the window, “I know you’re eager to return to the field, Shepard, but your implants are experimental, the doctors don’t know how well they’ll do under strain.”

Shepard hated this answer, and Hackett could see, which put him at in worse position to deliver more bad news. “The fact is Shepard, saying these implants are experimental was an understatement. I’m sure you’ve intimidated the doctors into telling you the origin of the implants. They’re newer than the Turian-Krogan alliance, with even more growing pains.”

“No shit.”

“Until you woke up a few days ago, no one believed you ever would, and I’m sorry to admit that included me. You’ve walked away from worse Shepard, but these implants don’t have the research or the funding that Cerberus did. That blast wiped out the reapers, but it destroyed the tech keeping you alive as well. If the keepers had delayed repairs on the section we found you in, there would’ve been no bringing you back this time.”

Shepard looked to her arms, the implants much more noticeable than her Cerberus ones, metal and glowing lights shining from beneath the skin. “This was a shot in the dark.”

“If there was a chance, we weren’t going to risk losing you, but we didn’t set our expectations high.”

“Highly classified.”

“Of course.”

“How classified?”

“Besides myself, the doctors you’ve seen, and a small team of turian and krogan scientists, everyone believes you died alongside the reapers. You’re a hero, Shepard, I want you to understand that.”

Shepard scoffed, it was like waking up in the Cerberus lab all over again, accept it was a familiar face telling her the news this time. Dead to the galaxy… again, with promises of glory as the only prize. She gestured to her implants, “They don’t expect them to work?”

“Like I said, they haven’t been field tested. They were modeled with the data we had, using your old implants as the blueprint, but our records are incomplete, and Cerberus intel is hard to come by these days. Most of their data was wiped by remaining operatives after the Illusive Man’s disappearance.”

Shepard noted another thing to probably not tell Hackett about. “When can I field test them then?”

“As soon as the doctors are assured that your condition is stable, you’ll need to be at your best when everyone finds out the galaxy’s hero survived all this.”

“No pressure.”

“That’s why I’m urging caution on this. Take things slow, Shepard. You saved the galaxy, but there’s still a place for you as we rebuild, when you’re ready.” Hackett glanced at the console on the wall. “You should get rest, Shepard. In the meantime, I’ll see what I can do about contacting the Normandy.”

“Thank you, sir.” Shepard tried to stand to salute as Hackett left, but she couldn’t muster the strength.

“At ease, solider.” he said, as the doors closed behind him.

Rest and ease weren’t words Shepard was really familiar with, and she didn’t feel like spending the time getting acquainted with them now. Every morning, she walked laps around her room, repped push-ups against the wall; baby steps to get her back in action. The doctors were impressed with her progress, but worried that her small hospital room would soon no longer be enough to contain her. Hackett had concerns launching Shepard back into action so quickly. Her loss deeply affected a galaxy that was so grateful for her sacrifice. Seeing her return now, and not be the Shepard they remember, could cause a range of problems. He doubted people would just believe Shepard suddenly came back from the dead, as a return of the Shepard VI or a clone seems more likely than supposed resurrection.

But Hackett knew keeping Shepard out of the ring could be even worse. Unity was holding, for now. As the council species rebuilt their strength, he feared they may not feel the need to rely on each other for much longer. Shepard brought them together, and she was the galaxy’s best chance of keeping it that way for the time being.

His decision to keep Shepard’s condition a secret from even those closest to her was a tough call on Hackett’s part. While he felt the Normandy deserved the truth about their commander, false hope seemed more cruel than lying. Attempts to avoid messages from Hannah Shepard were particularly difficult. With Shepard’s quick recovery, he doubted he made the right call, and worried what would happen if knowledge of her survival got out.

Hackett knew to keep things especially discreet to avoid any detection by the Shadow Broker, but knew a day would come that something would slip through the cracks.

“As I said,” Glyph’s robotic voice echoed off the walls of Liara’s room, “A complete sweep of the Citadel has been completed, based on the complied records of the council, alliance, keepers—”

“I understand that... I…” Liara typed frantically on her console, sorting through the records Glyph was referring to. “I just don’t believe they didn’t find anything.”

“Based on complied records from—”

“Thank you, Glyph.” Liara said, sharply, more of a command than a courtesy.

Glyph returned to his station, and Liara focused in on her data, bringing up all records on the Citadel’s clean-up. Every log, communication, transmission, docking, records of scavengers selling off reaper tech as souvenirs. Nothing about Shepard’s remains or even a trace of her.

“Maybe it was foolish to think there’d be anything to…” Liara said, to Glyph or herself, not able to finish the sentence without breaking into tears.

This was the second time she’d lost Shepard in this way, though the last time they were lovers. Though their relationship was different, Liara felt just as dedicated to finding Shepard now as she was then, even if it was just to lay her to rest. There was never any animosity between the two of them when they parted. Liara had changed over the two years Shepard was gone, and Shepard, back to life, was changed as well. There was the occasional jealousy when Shepard would spend her time with Garrus, but Liara was more focused on Shepard’s happiness, and Garrus really made her happy.

Digging again and again through all her compiled records, Liara just couldn’t fathom there being not a trace of Shepard left on the Citadel, not even ashes. The keepers records were very thorough as they catalogued everything they came across during the restoration. That combined with the alliance, council, and other efforts, someone had to have come across something. Liara would settle for a just a shred of Shepard’s armor.

Otherwise, Liara couldn’t shake the feeling that Shepard wasn’t really gone.

#mass effect #mass effect fic #mass effect fanfiction #shepard x garrus #femshep #f!shepard #destroy ending #post-canon fic #commander shepard #garrus vakarian #liara t'soni

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biotic-boshtet · 2 years

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Savior of The Galaxy (x3) beach trip?

#mass effect #commander shepard #custom femshep #femshep #post destroy ending #norah jean shepard #kaidan is behind the camera #nothing is bothering them #they are on a nice vacation #they are happy and there is peace :)#arty art art

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vespaer77 · 2 years

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"You must be remarkably strong-willed, Commander..." Liara's own words floated back to her from across time and space, from a long-ago, far-away memory, from a happier, simpler time. By comparison, anyway. Was she responsible for this precedent? Did the power in those words mold Shepard into the woman she was now? If so, she hated herself for it. She would never be so intentionally cruel to the woman she loved.

Summary: Commander Shepard has been a lot of things: a hero, a lover, a commercial, a corpse. Her face was on recruitment posters and cereal boxes and magazines, even a VI. But one thing that face never got to do was cry. She went through something as viscerally profound and life-altering as saving an entire galaxy... but was never allowed to shed one single, healthy, emotionally stable tear.

I wrote this fic to fix that.

Fandom: Mass Effect 3 and post Mass Effect 3

Pairing: FemShep/Liara T’Soni

Rating: Teen, for language

(There is also an mShep version of this fic because I identify as gender fluid and liked the idea of multiple gender expressions for the fic.)

#mass effect #mass effect fan fiction #mass effect fan fic #shiara #shepard x liara #femshep x liara #commander shepard #liara t'soni #destroy ending #spacer background #post me3

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lonesurvivorao3 · 1 month

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Pandoras Box Ch17

“If you show that devious, lying shrew one atom’s worth of compassion, I will shoot you myself,” said Garrus, in the same disconnected tone the woman he spoke about so often used.

As far as he was concerned, some moron left the gates of Hell open, allowing her to crawl out and she needed putting back.

“Shut the fuck up and let him speak,” spat Jack, hopping up onto the counter behind Kaidan.

He palmed the side of his face wearily, taking in the harsh words and tension filling the room even though it was only virtual.

#mass effect fanfic #mass effect fanfiction #femshep #canon divergence #kaidan alenko #angst #shenko #garrus vakarian #ruthlessrenegade #eris shepard #earthborn shepard #renegade shepard #garrus is not a yes man #post destroy ending

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bfpnola · 7 months

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ID 1: Screenshot from Let’s Talk Palestine’s Instagram text channel. Their most recent text reads:

“Hi everyone.

Gaza has officially run out of fuel and electricity. Here’s what this means:

Hospitals cannot operate without electricity. Emergency fuel will run out today.

Refrigerated food will now soon expire. As Israel has cut Gaza off of all food, this accelerates the threat of mass starvation looming over people, including more than 1 million kids. Children. Babies. Toddlers.

Media blackout: our access to information will become severely limited, as even foreign media outlets based in Gaza can no longer charge their equipment.

We have no words. Nothing can convey the horrors that will unfold unless the world forces Israel to stop. Nothing justified the deliberate starving and executing of children and civilians. SPEAK OUT.” Two red exclamation point emojis follow. At the time of the screenshot, 261 people had liked the message. End ID.

ID 2: Screenshot of Let’s Talk Palestine’s most recent Instagram post. First slide reads, “Israel is Pushing 2 million Gazans to the Brink of Death.

Israel has completely cut off all food supplies from Gaza. If not reversed, this decision sets Gaza on the path to mass starvation for all 2.3 million people living there.

Israel has destroyed the only exit out of Gaza. The Rafah Crossing into Egypt is effectively closed now after a third Israeli bombing in the last 24 hours.

This means that Gazans are now completely trapped with no way out to escape the bombings.” End ID.

ID 3: Continuing: “Israel has imposed a "total" siege on Gaza.

Cutting it off from electricity, water, and fuel. Without electricity, Gaza's already overflowing hospitals will no longer be able to save the lives of civilians attacked by Israel.

Israel is carpet bombing entire neighborhoods and cities - targeting residential buildings, hospitals, and UN schools.

An entire family has been wiped out in an Israeli airstrike, with all 19 members killed in their home, including children.” End ID.

ID 4: The next slide reads: “Israel threatened Egypt that it would bomb humanitarian aid deliveries to Gaza, prompting Egypt to withdraw its aid convoys.

177,000 PEOPLE ARE SEEKING REFUGE IN 88 U.N. SCHOOLS THAT HAVE BEEN CONVERTED INTO EMERGENCY SHELTERS but these schools are no longer safe as Israeli airstrikes have been targeting them.” End ID.

ID 5: Continuing: “10% OF THE POPULATION HAS ALREADY BEEN DISPLACED FROM THEIR HOMES IN JUST THREE DAYS.

THATS 20,000 PEOPLE.

200,000 children, mothers, fathers, and elderly.” End ID.

ID 6: The next slide reads: “50% OF GAZA'S POPULATION IS UNDER THE AGE OF 15.

ISRAEL HAS ALREADY KILLED 260 CHILDREN

HOSPITALS ARE OVERWHELMED AS THEY REACH FULL CAPACITY AND PRE-RESERVED MEDICAL RESOURCES HAVE BEEN DEPLETED AS 13 ISRAELI ATTACKS HAVE HIT GAZA'S HEALTH FACILITIES.” End ID.

ID 7: The final Instagram slide reads: “THIS IS NOT WAR.

MASS STARVATION IS NOT WAR.

BOMBING HOSPITALS IS NOT WAR.

WIPING OUT ENTIRE NEIGHBORHOODS IS NOT WAR.

THIS IS MASS MURDER.

THIS IS AN ANNIHILATION OF MORE THAN TWO MILLION PEOPLE ALREADY PERSECUTED UNDER APARTHEID.

SPEAK OUT.

BEFORE IT'S TOO LATE.” End ID.

ID 8: Screenshot of the caption for the aforementioned Instagram post. It reads: “This is not an exaggeration. This is not something we wrote lightly. Two million people are being dragged by Israel towards mass annihilation, and it's only escalating further every hour. The patterns are appearing, namely the policy of starvation.

And the thousands of people who adopted Israeli rhetoric in the last few days here on social media are complicit.

Before any mass atrocity is committed against a group of people, they are dehumanized. You called them terrorists, you called them barbaric. You naively played into Israelis' hands, having not at all learnt the lessons from the American so-called "War on Terror" where dehumanising rhetoric and accusations of terrOrism were used to justify and condition people to accept the mass murder of hundreds of thousands of Iraqis.

We are shocked, we are terrified, but most of all we are enraged that the world - especially privileged Westerners - never seem to ever learn their lesson. There are too many celebrities and even too many so-called "progressive activists" who are now complicit in these massacres.

This attack on Gaza it's different. It's different from all the previous attacks. People are saying goodbye to their loved ones abroad. Israel is planning annihilation.

Our people are being murdered. Our people are being slaughtered in their homes. Israeli pilots are targeting schools, hospitals and neighbourhoods. You care about civilians? SPEAK OUT. SHARE.”

33,917 people at the time of the screenshot had liked the post and 655 people had commented. End ID.

#reaux speaks #resources #bipoc #israel #free palestine #palestine #genocide #apartheid #occupation #health #youth liberation #gaza #annihilation #signal boost #food #electricity

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hyperfixationstation128 · 10 months

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So, earlier on Reddit, someone made a joke about the Destroy ending of Mass Effect and how EDI was probably downloaded onto a USB drive, and I had the bright idea to draw Joker akd EDI having a nice lil picnic post war. And uhh... well....

#mass effect #femshep #mass effect 3 #art #commander shepard #mass effect fanart #jeff joker moreau #EDI #destroy ending #please don't hate me I just thought it was funny okay?!

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yourtongzhihazel · 4 months

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Why I hate the '89 天安门广场 protests

In 1991, the Soviet Union was illegally dissolved. A few years later, the piece-meal destruction of Yugoslavia ended in war and genocide. The western, liberal/neoliberal world celebrated their destruction of state socialism. What had they accomplished?

CW: child prostitution, drug use, violence, death

Child prostitution in post-USSR Russia during the 1990s

The Children of Leningradskiy

Homeless children drug use

1993 constitutional crisis protests

These videos are about Russia only. There were 15 republics in the USSR. The dissolution of the USSR was an unmitigated humanitarian and economic disaster. All standards of life metrics from income to lifespan dropped to the floor. The GDP of Russia plummeted. Billionaires, bureaucrats, and especially foreign capital snatched up formerly Soviet state assets for pennies and reduced millions to poverty and destitution. At least 12 million people died as a DIRECT result of the dissolution of the USSR. Look at the former USSR: 15-20 countries (depending on who you ask) fighting each other in perpetual regional warfare. The concrete and cement plants in Turkmenistan sit empty and decaying. The Ukrainian shipyards on the Black sea, too.

So why bring up the USSR or Yugoslavia at all? Because they are a case and point in why you cannot let attempted color revolutions and liberalization protests take hold. The imperialists found that by employing this trick, of 'peaceful protests' they can destabilize then split apart nations then rob them blind. When a color revolution succeeds, people suffer on an unbelievable scale. The protestors in the USSR during glasnost wanted liberalization of the economy, freedom, democracy, so on and so forth, the usual western imperialist dog whistles. What they got was Yeltsin (and later Putin), poverty, and death.

Thankfully, the color revolution in China failed. It was crushed. so now we have a compare-and-contrast game (how fun!!!) between the handling of color revolutions in the USSR and in China. The MATERIAL EFFECT of the color revolutions in the former Soviet-bloc was the destruction of state socialism, the robbing of state assets, the destitution of the whole population, the penetration of foreign capital, the splitting of a once unified country into warlord states. On the other hand, the Chinese state remained and by 2020, eliminated absolute poverty.

IF the protestors had gotten what they wanted, IF the Chinese state was destroyed, we would see the EXACT same thing that happened to Yugoslavia, the USSR, East Germany, Czechoslovakia, Albania, and so on and so on repeat here. Except on an UNIMAGINABLE scale. 1.1 BILLION people were living in China in 1990. 1.1 BILLION reduced to poverty like you see in those videos, if not worse. Hundreds of billions of dollars of state assets in banks, factories, military, science, would have been stolen. Every bit of progress that Mao had accomplished would be rolled back to line the pockets of western imperialists. The country would most definitely be split up into warring regions, Xinjiang, TIbet, the Northeast, the Southwest, as much carnage as can be wrought to a people. THIS is the material reality that would greet the Chinese people if the '89 protestors got what they wanted.

They were chanting for child prostitution. For mass slavery. For mass poverty. For mass starvation. They stood on the side of the most evil entity to ever grace this planet. I will never forgive them.

Some reading on the '89 protests

#i fucking hate liberals

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ladyluscinia · 6 months

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I know my last experience with a season ending on a note everyone hated and unanimously tore to fucking shreds for destroying the story on every level was... atypical. Lockdown. 6 month mass hysteria at minimum. Conspiracy theories that were, like, real things we had on camera. There was a Twitter wedding. Creative fervor that broke 100k fics on AO3.

Like. I know this is not a rational point of comparison and I'm not going to expect anything in my lifetime to match it 🤣

But.

If that was the highest high of post-season fandom engagement built on a cocktail of tasting everything you ever wanted AND the absolutely lethal levels of spite and swearing to eat showrunners' hearts in the marketplace, then whatever the fuck is going on after OFMD S2 is the opposite of that.

OFMD S1 was a huge fandom explosion. One silly little streaming show that had a gay kiss and then it skyrocketed. Fic numbers were soaring, high activity fic and meta engagement lasted for at least four months, it was constantly trending and flooding the dash... Like, fucking hell, over a year and a half after the immediate finale fervor it beat Stucky in the top ships bracket?!? To the point I was willing to give it what felt like due credit toward its potential as a future juggernaut ship. Not guaranteed, of course, but the potential was there.

In that context, new content should be a blow out party. Which it kinda was pulling off as it was airing, but looking back now? Not even quite a month later?

The effect of S2 on the fandom is like... a blip. Possibly over already.

New fic numbers started dropping off the moment the finale aired and have returned to deep hiatus levels. It's dropped off trending and streaming leaderboards... I'm very curious to see the first tumblr Week in Review since the finale, though we're still waiting due to the holiday.

Like, I've even popped on to scroll a few Izzy hater blogs that I know loved the finale out of morbid curiosity what they were up to, and I'm telling you... if I hadn't just watched the new season I'd think they were still over a year into hiatus. Saw some standard bitching about the izcourse / Edward takes (aka the one thing that kept them going all hiatus), they're currently passing around posts mocking one specific long OFMD version of TJLC I'm just hearing of, the same BTS gifsets everyone else is thrilled by... But barely any new meta or discussions. There's like 2 people posting actual analysis of S2 that's getting reblogged and they aren't even names I recognize from the hiatus. Nor is it particularly interesting to read. 🤷‍♀️

In July of 2022 I could pop onto a random OFMD blog and scroll through a dozen enthusiastic Stede or BlackBonnet metas about jacket colors or that moth from 1x07 or lighthouse symbolism or whatever. Now the new stuff has the same energy as posts from June 2023. It's borderline dead. And this is what it's like when there's an active campaign to engage fandom and Renew as a Crew?

(I will say fanartists are bringing some energy and there's some lovely pieces being passed around, which I do think the Renew as a Crew campaign is helping to boost?)

Even the hundreds of people saying it was a beautiful season and they loved it so much don't seem to be finding it a very engaging or inspiring season.

It's such a turn, like, what the fuck.

#our flag means death #ofmd s2 #ofmd critical #fandom culture #i was counting on this season to still having me engaged in analysis come *january* and THAT'S not going to pan out obviously #but what the fuck #i'm turning over stones like 'surely the excited fandom is hiding here' and then it's 3 bugs with an anti-izzy pamphlet #like if people weren't trying to process their dislike of the finale then half this fandom's new content wouldn't exist #and that's not promising for the long run 👀👀👀#ladyluscinia

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shipsnthenight · 2 years

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Anyone know what time it is? Oh yeah, time for my yearly scheduled mass-murdering of the shiara fandom... with feelings.

In this episode: "Little blue children grow up".

#mass effect #shiara #liara t'soni #femshep #jane shepard #commander shepard #female shepard #mass effect trilogy #post destroy ending #mass effect legendary edition

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factual-fantasy · 7 months

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(post in question) @elegysonnet

Thank you! None of my ideas are really solid yet.. but I can explain the reasoning behind their designs and tell you a bit of the back stories that I've got so far! :}} (prepare for a WALL of text-YOU ASKED FOR IT--)

First, Jevil. I pictured my Jevil being locked away in a cell for many many years. Like I think canon Jevil was. The wear and tear you see on his clothes is just wear that developed overtime from being in that cell. I might update his old outfit later.. but so far the torn gloves, missing bell and worn shoe are from the years of being locked away. Now eventually he is able to break out of his cell and escape into the multiverse. I'm not sure how, but thinking its gonna have to do with mirrors. He probably wanted to go back to his AU, but if he did he'd just wind up right back in that cell. So he.. left. And just kind'a roams the multiverse now, looking for a new home I guess.

Now during his travels he was able to find bits of clothing to replace/repair his old outfit. Replacing his shirt, finding a new cape, cutting out a corner to patch his new shirt- Finding a cheap Christmas bell to replace his old one. Using standard bandages to patch his shoe- cutting a square out of the overalls to fit his tail and patch his torn hat- <XDD stuff like that.

Now turning to Grillby.. My Grillby's AU was suddenly destroyed. And Jevil saved him from being destroyed along with it. But Grillby isn't exactly grateful.. rather he's overcome with grief over the loss of his world and family, and is actually angry with Jevil for having saved him. He would have rather just been extinguished along side his wife and daughter..

Because of this emotional turmoil, Grillby tuned blue and stayed blue. (See this post for my Grillby color headcanons-) I drew him in his bartender outfit but that wont stick. He ends up wearing what ever trash clothes he can find. His uniform is the last existing thing from his AU. And he dare not let his emotional instability burn it up. So he keeps it folded up neatly in his backpack and just tosses the backpack aside when he gets upset enough to start burning things uncontrollably..

Now for the creepy one, Spamton! He comes from an AU where things function a bit differently then our usual Deltarune. One of the big differences is the acid in the queens castle is blue instead of green. And yes! I did go with the acid lake theory :00-- but instead shrinking when falling into the acid.. my Spamton just kind'a.. fell apart. Its like the structural integrity of his body just collapsed. He kind'a got Gastered- The outer layer of his face and hands got so dry that huge splits formed all over his face and knuckles. His teeth got stuck together and became one big glob of hard mass. His hair melted together, his pants and shirt became part of him.. Its pretty yucky. He was in so much pain and he didn't know what to do.. Well, that's when Jevil showed up.

I'm thinking that taking Spamton outside of his AU didn't eliminate his pain.. rather.. being away from his world effected his body and.. changed his pain. Changed how it hurts or where it hurts. In a way, Spamton is in "less pain" when he's outside of his AU, because the pain is different and more.. tolerable..? Somewhat.?? So he chose to leave his AU and stay with Jevil. Its not like he was leaving anything behind.. the people in his AU treated him horribly. As they traveled, they got a cloak and some goggles/glasses for him. Spamton also struggled with motor function in his hands. like Gaster.. So Jevil wrapped them in bandages to keep them together and help them move more coherently.

Also Grillby kind'a envy's Spamton for having an AU to freely return to. And thinks that despite the pain and struggles, he should return. He still has the opportunity to make a life for himself there. But you cant really blame Spamton for following the only person who has ever shown him kindness and changed his blinding pain into something else..

Then there's Goner kid. I'm thinking that she is from an AU where she fell into the core perhaps? But she's not a part of Gaster. She doesn't have anything that ties herself to him. She's just, out there. All alone..

Jevil finds her and feels sorry for her.. so he helps her to get back to her AU. Only to discover that another version of her already exists and took her place. In order to bring her back to her world, you would have to destroy her other self.. But her other self is a person too.. someone who can love, who can think, its a person. Jevil wont kill her and Goner kid doesn't want him too. But she's still heart broken.

Her entire identity was stolen. She has nothing left to her name.. not ever her name. Its not hers anymore. So to cheer her up Jevil gives her a new name. One completely unique to her. Goner kid smiles, and decides to follow Jevil where ever he goes. She cant have her old life or name back, but she can live a new life, with her new name and new best friend. (I might reveal that name in a future comic👀👀)

Eventually during their travels they come across an AU where Alphys made robot arms for Monster Kid. Now MK is like a teenager in this AU so he doesn't need the other arm models that Alphys built for him. So she simply gives a pair of little arms to Goner kid! The pink bow was also a gift from Jevil so there's that XD-

Now River person.. I haven't really been able to flesh her out too much actually. But I'm thinking that River person is in a similar situation to Goner kid and Grillby. She cant go back to her AU for some reason and is heart broken. Maybe it was destroyed like Grillby's was? I imagine that she's not mad at Jevil for saving her though. And I don't think she'd be grieving her life like Grillby is. More of.. she's grieving for.. everyone else's life?? She would take people on trips down the river and hear about their life and stories. Their hopes and dreams.. Hear about what the children wanted to be when they grew up. Only to have all that snuffed out. Gone. Yet she remains? Why her? She feels that compared to the others from her world.. She was simple. Was of less value then those that she spoke to. She feels like someone, anyone should have been saved in her place. Maybe survivors guilt would be a good way to put it?

But she's not angry with Jevil for saving her. Just.. hollow. Conflicted.. appreciative..? But still conflicted-

ANYWAYS, wall of text over XDD I hope you enjoyed reading all of that and I answered all of your burning questions. :}} Feel free to send more!

#my response #deltarune #undertale #jevil #spamton #grillby #goner kid #river person

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persephoneggsy · 4 months

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so i did this a while back, finally remembered it, and now i'm posting it

Mass Effect x Dragon Age AU

I did one of these already, sort of, for ME: Andromeda, but this one is set in the Milky Way.

Elaborations below:

Merrill is a quarian who was exiled from the Migrant Fleet. She's looking for a way not to destroy the geth, but to bring them back under quarian control, thinking they're too valuable a resource to just get rid of. Unfortunately, this made many quarians view her as dangerous, and she was exiled for the crime of experimental geth research. Making Merrill a quarian was the first choice I did for this AU, I think it fits really well.

Aveline is an asari. I'd considered krogan or turian, or simply keeping her human, but in the end I went with asari mostly because Aveline always struck me as condescending in the same way many asari are, lol. She's a commando who later moved to the Citadel to join C-SEC.

Isabela is a turian. She's a barefaced turian, meaning she has no association to a colony. Instead of following the typical turian tradition of proudly serving in the Hierarchy's military, Isabela instead ran off to become a space pirate, specializing in smuggling. She frequents the bars around Omega and has earned herself a fearsome reputation among the mercenaries.

Bethany remains a human; she grew up on a colony world with her siblings, and had a relatively peaceful childhood, despite the Alliance constantly badgering her parents to send her and her older sister to their biotic training program.

Marian, also a human, eventually ran away from home to become a mercenary. She resented her father for forbidding her and her siblings from joining the Alliance - not because she was particularly patriotic, but she felt like her father's grudge against the Alliance prevented her and her siblings from receiving the best training possible. Her powerful biotics made her both an asset and a target, and she soon caught the eye of a certain Council Spectre...

Fenris is a drell. He was raised under the Compact, an agreement between the drell and the hanar, and his purpose was to become a bodyguard... And then his training group was attacked by batarian slavers and he was taken captive. For many years, Fenris suffered under the batarians' rule, until he finally managed to escape. Unwilling to return home, he instead roams the galaxy, taking out as many batarian slaving operations as he can.

Anders is a human who escaped from a biotic testing facility run by Cerberus. Though this left him with a grudge against Cerberus, he also hates the Alliance, whom he sees as no better and will also use biotic children as weapons. He dreams of establishing a safe haven for biotics, and is willing to go to increasingly drastic measures to see that dream become a reality.

Varric is a volus. Unlike his business-minded brother, Varric does not spend his days negotiating trade agreements or doing finance consultations. Spending his days at the Afterlife bar on Omega, he's an information broker, and a pretty damn good one at that. With his specially crafted weapon Bianca, he's not too bad in a fight, either.

Carver, much like his older sister, left home to seek out his own path, and ended up joining the Alliance against his parents' wishes. He thrived in the military, quickly climbing the ranks due to his strength and competency. He's being primed for N7 training under the wathcful eye of Spectre Sebastian Vael.

Sebastian is a human, and a Council Spectre (I'm imagining this AU as a sort of nebulous period where humanity isn't as looked down upon as they were at the start of ME1, and there are a fair number of human Spectres running around). A wild child in his youth, his parents sent him to the Alliance to straighten him out, and to their relief, it worked like a charm. He specializes in covert missions and favors sniper rifles and tech powers.

#my art #mass effect au #mass effect x dragon age au #sebhawke #yeah it's technically sebhawke bc of course sebastian and marian are going to kiss have you even met me #marian hawke #sebastian vael #i'm not tagging everyone lol #lowkey i was worried about posting this in case Weirdos(tm) saw it and grilled me about my choices but y'know #life is for living etc etc #and yeah a lot of them are obviously based on existing ME characters and backstories but I still like this

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milkywayes · 4 months

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dreamt a cipher

a shepard/garrus post-destroy ending longfic.

[AO3 link]

I’ve debated a while about when to start posting this. Now it’s the new year, and I’ve been working on Cipher for over a year and a half, and I’ve waited long enough to start sharing it with you all. I’ve decided it’s finally time to start uploading while I work on the final chapters.

I started writing this before I ever drew a single piece of fanart for Mass Effect. It’s all the things that were bouncing around in my head after choosing the destroy ending with a mostly-paragon Shepard—consequence and responsibility and self-recrimination; her relationship with Garrus and with herself; their ties to each other and how much weight they can bear; their differing perspectives and how they slot together—all that fun stuff—compressed into a story, a place, a narrative.

I believe in the power of love, and I promise a happy ending. They’ve just been taking the long way to get there. Feel free to yell at me in the meantime.

A huge thank you to @callista-curations for her meticulous and invaluable beta work, and to @that-wildwolf and @gammaraydeath for being the best hypemen I could ask for!

A more detailed list of warnings can be found on AO3.

I've posted the full cover art here.

────

Summary:

Pairing: Female Shepard/Garrus Vakarian Rating: M (subject to change) Important Tags: post-destroy ending - angst with a happy ending - slow burn (of sorts) - arguing - reconciliation - survivor guilt - minor original characters Her own personal Noverian peak. That’s what it was supposed to be. Nothing but the discovery: no distractions, no comfort, no windows looking out—no familiar faces. But it's starting to look like her winning streak might have ended in that pile of Citadel rubble, if it ever extended that far to begin with. ──── “How does the Earth idiom go? No use beating a dead—” A long-suffering sigh. “What was it again?” “A dead horse. And yet, you’re here. Beating it.” Pot, kettle. She wishes he’d just fucking say it.

-> AO3.

Read the start of Chapter 1: Constant Velocity under the cut!

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The overhead lights flicker as they always do when the data screens are up and running. It’s not something one gets used to, even so. It stings at her ocular nerves—or something like that, anyway, somewhere along the delicate wires that extend from her eyeballs into her brain—but her focus on the data doesn’t waver.

“In that case,” says Shepard, squinting against the ache, “what we need is salvage from a relay outside the immediate burst zone. Four jumps away. Five, if possible. There’s no point to any of this if we can’t scrape together a control group.”

She glances back at Elsawy, who so far hasn’t made it more than a meter into the room. She nods without looking up from her omni-tool; orange shimmers off her shiny, black hair, giving her the uncomfortable air of a Cerberus operative. Not the worst comparison, except that Miranda would waste no time letting her know if her logic took a faulty turn somewhere. Elsawy’s just as likely to agree now and write a message detailing all her crap conclusions later.

Leaning her hip against the conference table, Shepard shifts her weight off her left leg, bites down on the sigh that almost manages to slip out. Once in the clear, she grouses, “Where the hell is Meyer? He’s the one that called this meeting.”

As it is, it’s three people in attendance and she’s the only one talking. She could’ve achieved the same results with a voice call from her quarters, where she could elevate her leg in peace and without witnesses. In the dark.

“Lab Two,” answers Elsawy, finally ripping her attention off the omni-screen and gracing Shepard with a second of eye contact. Maybe in another life she could appreciate the effort—Jesus, as if she hasn’t had her fill of lives already. “We’re close to a breakthrough on the initial output patterns. Sorry. He’s been feeding his data to me.”

“Right.” She blinks once, twice, in time with the flickering. It doesn’t help; it never does. “I’ll swing by later, then. Anything else he asked you to relay?”

“Just that, Commander.” Elsawy is mumbling just enough that her voice has to compete with the drone of the air vents. The translator takes a second to filter out and amplify it. The result is less than perfect: “More salvage—” bzzrt—“bigger picture, you got it.” She narrows her eyes, and Shepard raises a brow. “Left leg or—” bzz!—“left hip?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Commander.”

“It’s nothing relevant,” she says pleasantly, forcing herself to stand up straight again. There’s a brief tremor shaking up her hamstrings; she waves a hand to distract from it. In the frenzy of the lights, the movement looks jerky, nervous. She soldiers on. “Old field injury. Unrelated. Anything can set it off.”

Funny, kind of, since it’s that very leg that ends in the most perfect, cooperative example of a foot she’s ever had the pleasure of treading on. It’s cloned; a replacement. Not the only one either. They should’ve just done away with the whole limb, but she hadn’t been consulted. Same with her trick shoulder. Not even Cerberus had managed to get that one back on the straight and narrow.

“I’d rather you bring it up with the doctor,” replies Elsawy. This is, apparently, what it takes for her to finally speak at a reasonable volume. “If we manage to fill even one of the data gaps…”

“I know,” she says. “I know, and I’m telling you, it’s unrelated.”

-> continue reading on AO3

#mass effect fanfiction #shakarian #fanfic #shakarian fic #oh GOD. here it is. I'm BIRTHING this baby like Shepard birthed grunt #I'm so nervous but I am really proud of this story so Take it.#cipher tag

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