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Commander John Shepard (spectrestatus) wrote in makebelievelog, @ 2013-08-14 09:52:00

Who: Commander Shepard (Narrative)
What: Arrival
When: 2186 / Wednesday afternoon
Where: Milky way Galaxy, Local Cluster, Sol System, Outskirts of Earth/ His brand new room
Rating/Warnings: PG/length
Status: Complete



"Alliance fleet reporting. Turian fleet reporting. Asari fleets reporting." The pilot's hands floated effortlessly across the holographic control boards in front of him, an act Shepard could only see in his peripheral vision. He'd long surmised that, if really put to the test, Joker could fly the Normandy in his sleep, and likely did often enough in his dreams. It wasn't something to mull over now as Shepard's own gaze focused out the bridge window while the massive form of the Destiny Ascension slid past, dwarfing the frigate many times over. The massive fleet, the universe's fleet, had amassed all around them in numbers so great that it was almost impossible to discern the furthest ships from the stars dotting the void of space.

The largest army every assembled, yet Shepard felt the knot in his stomach tighten as he wondered once again if it was all going to be enough. It had to be, they didn't have any other options.

"Quarian fleets accounted for and ready," came the garbled answering call of the flotilla admiral over the comm link.

"Geth fleet reporting." Joker's voice came again, but it seemed to fade into the distance now as Shepard's attention moved for a brief instant, their destination coming into full view ahead of them.

Oh, god, the thought came so quickly that Shepard almost didn't catch himself before he spoke it aloud. He'd known what to expect, had prepared himself for it, or tried to. He couldn't forget the way Vancouver had looked upon their departure, and that had been after less than an hour of attack. Weeks had passed since then, and he'd seen the damage to Thessia, to Palaven. The planet was a marble of black shadow on deep blue, cracks of molten orange stretching from coastline to coastline over the familiar masses of land. The entire East coast of the United North American States was vibrantly aglow, and for a brief moment he wondered if James was looking out as well from somewhere on the ship, seeing the more prominent blaze of color at New York, his home. Shepard himself may have been born in space, but Earth was Earth. It was a safe haven to go back to when all other places fell. It was home for all of humanity, and it was burning.

The reapers were coming into view now, massive black ships barring the path through the planet's atmosphere, and Shepard felt rage replace the grief that had been so prominent only a moment before.

Dimly he became aware that the sound around him had dulled, as if the pressure on the bridge had changed and his ears were in desperate need of a good pop. His jaw flexed in an effort to alleviate the problem, but to no avail, and be briefly allowed himself to curse his eustachian tubes for having such poor timing.

Joker was speaking again, but the words may as well have been traveling through a thick soup for all Shepard could understand them. His whole world seemed to be slowing down, the pilot's fingers not flying quite as quickly as before, and even the ships outside had nearly stopped their advance. There was a piercingly persistent buzz in his ear now, and Shepard raised an armor-covered hand to the side of his head as he closed his eyes. Silence came as abruptly as someone flipping an OFF switch, and he couldn't help the audible sigh of relief that escaped him.

"Could you repeat that, Joker?" Shepard's call came just as he opened his eyes, immediately realizing that his pilot wouldn't be responding at all.

The room was rich with near-gaudy elegance, vibrant colors and expensive-looking material. In his initial shock, his first thought was how distinctly human it looked after spending so much time on the Citadel. He recovered quickly, glancing down and around to assess his personal status. His armor and weapons were check, and nothing visually seemed to be out of place or different about him. Was it a dream? No, no matter how strange the sensation had been, he'd been too on-edge to simply take a standing power nap on the bridge before a reaper battle.

Raising his arm, the bright orange glow of his omnitool covered him from hand to elbow, and a scan of his surroundings told him that, at the very least, it was real. So, not a simulator, and it lacked the jarring unpredictability of a Prothean vision.

"Joker, do you copy?" The omnitool's communicator returned silence in response, and he paced a little over the ornate carpet as he tried again. "EDI, are you there?" He broadened the broadcast radius and spoke again, moving toward the window to peer out at the view of a lake outside. "This is Commander Shepard of the SSV Normandy, does anyone copy?"

The quiet that followed wasn't entirely unexpected. Investigating further, he noted that there was no connection to the extranet, which told him that he was either somewhere out of range, or the signal was purposefully being blocked. Neither possibility boded very well. A quick review of the user files loaded onto the omnitool at least let him know that no data seemed to be missing. John turned his focus to the room itself, taking a tally of the size and how much open space there was to move in, items that could be used as weapons, or might hold recording devices. It took only a few seconds for him to note a handful of objects on the comforter of the large, opulent bed. They'd been put there purposefully, but he wasn't taking any chances. He circled the piece of furniture warily, eying the space beneath with caution before he neared, taking the paper in hand first.

"Make believe," he spoke out loud, almost without thinking, his tone holding the same degree of dryness he might have used in response to someone telling a bad joke. His mind reviewed what it could tell so far about who had dropped him there, that they'd left him with his weapons and armor, and hadn't done any obvious tampering with his omnitool. That meant no reapers or Cerberus, not that either was likely to use "make believe" as a battle setting in the first place. The words seeped a certain amount of tension out of the situation, though the chance that anyone would play a practical joke on him like this so close to returning to Earth was so near to zero that he almost passed over the idea entirely. It had to be a joke though, right? An elaborate, very well-planned joke that was going to result in someone (or more likely, several someones) sorting out widgets for the rest of their natural born lives. He recognized the currency for what it was, though what planet's currency it was escaped him, and slid it into an armor compartment along his waist, doing the same with the trolley pass.

The small device that was left was something Shepard glanced at warily, scanning with his omnitool twice before deciding to leave it behind for the moment. The television was tempting, as finding a news station was a great way to assess what was going on in the environment as a whole, but who knew how loud the sound would be when it turned on. Caution was best for the moment. He stepped carefully toward one of the doors, opening it to reveal a rather posh looking bathroom. The fixtures all seemed to work fine, and a scan proved that the water was drinkable. He investigated the empty closet before carefully moving to the bedroom door, sliding it open by a fraction to peer out into the empty sitting room beyond. Further searching brought him to a room that mirrored the one he'd started out in, but no one inside. Nothing in any of the rooms seemed automated, and anything of real technological value seemed to be on his person.

He clearly identified the last door in the sitting room as the entrance, approaching it in silence before leaning his head close to listen for what he might find on the other side. No noise greeted him. He dared to open the it partway, enough to glance down the unpopulated corridor beyond. If nothing else, the architecture was impressive. He cloaked himself before stepping out onto the stone floor, crossing the hall to the window directly opposite of the door. The courtyard below was populated with humans, none that he recognized during his quick glance. At the same time, none of them looked particularly dangerous either, and with a little less hesitation he walked back toward the group of rooms he'd started in, closing the door behind him.

In the sitting room, he mentally reviewed everything that had happened over the past few minutes, and tried not to think if the battle at Earth was going on without him. If this place was real, and all scans told him it was, could it be on Earth? Speculating wasn't going to give him any real answers, and he made his way back to the first room, leaving the door between open wide. The communicator and the letter sat side by side on the bedspread where he'd left them, and he eyed the first with a wary sort of reluctance.

Well, he had to start somewhere....