Commander Shepard (evertheheroine) wrote in knowhereic, @ 2017-07-21 03:00:00 |
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Entry tags: | mass effect: canon: commander shepard, mass effect: canon: sara ryder |
Who: Commander Shepard (Open to the Space Ladies)
What: Shepard gets her memories back and a wish comes true
Where: Her apartment.
When: Backdated to the 18th, since it took me longer to finish this than I'd thought.
Rating: Medium to high, Flashbacks and general unpleasantness for Shepard, minimally talk of death and sacrifice.
Status: Narrative (possible thread), complete.
Shepard never slept well. No doubt it was something both Sara and Jyn were used to by now. Almost every night she'd wake up at some point, say nothing, and either go for a run or climb into the shower for awhile. Since the more recent invasion, it'd only gotten worse. She didn't like to admit it, but Grey's words had worried her a fair amount. For all she knew, whatever, however, she'd ended up here, the Reapers had come with her. Even, finally, managing to deal Sovereign a death blow hadn't cut that thought down. The rest of the Reapers had only retreated. What if they were still out there? This hadn't been like before, had the catalyst even worked? The questions were dogged and relentless, they had been since she'd picked up consciousness in the Medical center with her only real solace being the distractions she got in being there for the other people who'd needed her. The problem was, almost no one needed her when she was sleeping. There was nothing to keep those thoughts at bay in the rare moment she was able to shut her eyes and rest. It was when the real trouble started. Groans of discomfort, the rapid twitching of eyelids, the flexing of fingers into tight and trembling fists. They were all signs of what was to come on in the landscape of her dreams. They were hallmarks of that same, awful, pattern, signs that the redundant nightmare was going to repeat itself. Soon she'd be standing there again, unable to help the boy or, worse still, getting to him just in time to see themselves both consumed. Whichever way it went, and it didn't really matter, the end result was always the same: She'd end up gasping for air and waking up with a jolt. Only this time, when she opened her eyes, it wasn't the room that she saw. In fact, she didn't know what she saw at all. It took her eyes moments to register there was even light at all. Before it would happen even, she was certain of a tightness in her chest -- no, a weight. It was something that made it hard to breathe. I must have been dreaming, she thought, strange and sudden as the notion was. It was the only thing that really made sense...and yet...sounds. More sounds were beginning to filter into her ears. The sound of Earth being moved, of stone and rubble grinding against one another. She could feel the sense of weight lifting from her, could vaguely make out the shape of figures, of voices as they were shouting for people. Everything still felt strained, still felt blurry... She could feel herself pulling air into her lungs, drawing focus to the ringing world around her. She could see the sky, still fading from it's dull orange hue, could see stars returning to the skyline...and could see the Reapers falling out of it. If there'd been a more welcome sight in any of the whole world, Adeleis couldn't have told you what it was, she wouldn't have have had a clue. What was more was just how...real...it all felt. Sure, she could tell you everything hurt but, really, when hadn't it lately? She'd shown up in Knowhere -- which was a weird enough thought to slip into her dream self's head -- and had gotten herself tossed almost once a month since then...but this was different. She didn't know how it was different, but it was different. There was just something more...real to it. This didn't feel like a dream, this...this felt like a memory. This felt like something that had happened to her before...like she was somehow standing in the middle of her own past and watching it happen in a way that was different from the world she knew now. Only...it wasn't different. She was still herself, she could remember watching Anderson die...she could remember listening to the Catalyst go on in a, as she took it, last ditch plea to keep the Reapers from being destroyed. She remembered making her choice. She remembered surrendering to what it would mean for her, she remembered the peace she'd felt at that idea, the sense of vindication and justice for all those lost now and the countless number of times it had happened since then. She remembered being ready to die for that and having no one damn complaint about it. She remembered, remembered dying for it. Again. She remembered the bright light and the world seeming to just...go out. She remembered...she remembered this now. Of being alive, of the Reapers having been beaten, of people trying to sit her up, to snap their fingers in front of her and see how with it she was. She remembered trying to wave them off, the motion all heavy and jerked. She could vaguely make out the words 'Normandy' and 'Call them back'. She struggled for a moment, ignoring the way her body moved like a Marionette that had taken a tumble down a flight of stairs, she remembered trying to move to her feet before collapsing back against the stones behind her in a way that jolted her again. Another sharp breath, this one punctuated by several flashes of light she couldn't quite make sense of it. It was like someone flipping through a series of slides, but very, very, quickly. Almost too fast for her brain to process. The ship, she recognized. The crew too, bright little moments. Snapshots of some jungle she couldn't identify. The ship was crashed but...but there were people and they were okay. It squeezed tight at her chest in her sleep and that, coupled with her real-life injuries still threatening her with soreness and a refusal to work right, drew another sharp breath into her lungs... One that would indeed see her eyes shoot open and Adeleis sit up straight in bed as the gasp pulled from her in a way that left her coughing. Whatever that was...whatever was suddenly very much going on inside her head, Adeleis Shepard knew two things: One, she needed to get up, out of bed, dressed, and go for a walk. She needed to shake this feeling off as quickly as possible, needed to set aside whatever feeling she had in the put of her stomach -- both the good one and the bad one -- and she needed to just...walk if off. The second thing she knew was that she was tired of this and she needed some goddamned sleep. She needed just one night where the world didn't seem to hound her or take some crazy turn of events towards things she knew now, despite having no idea how she knew them. Knowing her crew was alive. Knowing the Reapers, at least where she was from, were dead? She'd take those victories. Maybe tomorrow night she'd sleep better having had a day to process what had happened. Maybe she'd talk about it with Jyn and Sara. Maybe she'd just get drunk and pass out because she left herself no other option. All she did know, as she finished dressing and made her way out into the kitchen, was something simple. It was a tiny thing, something she'd thought many times but, for whatever reason, chose to actually give it a voice this time. She knew it sure as she knew she was splashing very cold water on her face and maybe that was why she said it real quiet and under her breath; too afraid to lean hard on her own weakness, to acknowledge she was floundering in exhaustion even to herself. "...I wish that the Normandy was here. Maybe even EDI, she could talk me to sleep or tell me how everyone's doing..." Because that, really, was what she wanted more than anything else in the whole world reality right now: Some kind of validation that maybe, eventually, things were going to be okay. |